We’re so excited that Thanksgiving is just around the corner! We love everything about this time of year, from the cooler weather to spending time with family and delicious food.
Another great thing about Thanksgiving is all the time to do crafts like this turkey handprint craft. These little turkeys are so cute and make a great decoration for your Thanksgiving table!
Plus, they’re a fun way for kids to get involved in the holiday preparations and make a fun keepsake. So grab some paper and some paint, and let’s get started!
If you’ve never made any handprint crafts with your kids, you’re really in for a treat.
It’s a great way to get your kids’ creativity flowing and work on fine motor skills without them knowing they’re doing it! Plus, they’ll be so proud when they’ve each made their little turkey memento.
Start by downloading the template and printing it out. Once the template is printed, gather the materials for this fun activity. Get those scissors ready, and let’s help the kids bring this turkey to life!
First, encourage your child to glue the light brown turkey belly onto the turkey’s lower body.
Now, help your child to glue the paper eyeballs or googly eyes to the turkey’s head, above the beak.
Trace your child’s hand onto the colored card stock of your choice four times (these will be the turkey’s feathers) and cut them all out.
Finally, guide your child to fan out the colored handprints, then glue the completed turkey onto the handprints.
Be sure to check out our Thanksgiving crafts while you’re here! Your little ones will enjoy making more fun projects like this!
Don’t let the Thanksgiving fun stop here! The festive season is the perfect time to create lasting memories. From sharing a good book to making cute Thanksgiving crafts, your kids will love getting in the holiday spirit.
Reading out loud to kids is so beneficial for their development. When you read to kids, they learn to focus, develop new vocabulary, and love reading. For those reasons and more, we recommend starting with books.
Turkey Trouble – If you’ve never read this book, you have to add it to your holiday collection! It’s so cute and fun and kids just love it! Follow the turkey around the farm as he disguises himself as different animals so the farmer doesn’t catch him for Thanksgiving dinner!
How To Catch A Turkey – Kids who love the How To Catch books will want to see all the crazy contraptions kids make to try to catch a turkey loose at the school!
Pete The Cat: The First Thanksgiving -Every Pete the Cat book is fantastic, but this one takes it up a notch with flaps for the kids to open. It’s a great way to get the kids excited about reading and Thanksgiving!
Thanksgiving is a beloved American holiday centered around food, family, and gratitude. A mainstay of nearly every Thanksgiving table is a beautifully roasted turkey. So what better way to get into the Thanksgiving spirit than by making some fun turkey hand crafts out of construction paper with your kids? Read on for step-by-step instructions on how to craft cute and easy turkey hands to decorate your home for the holidays.
Gather Your Materials
Making turkey hands out of construction paper requires only a few simple supplies
- Construction paper in various colors like brown, red, orange, yellow
- Scissors
- Glue stick
- Googly eyes (optional)
- Pencil
For more advanced turkey hands, you can also use additional decorative items like glitter, pom poms, sequins, and feathers.
Trace Your Hands
Start by having your child trace their hands on a sheet of brown construction paper Make sure they trace with fingers together and thumbs separated to form the classic turkey shape Trace about 5-6 hands per turkey.
Younger kids can just color the traced outline, while older kids can practice their scissor skills by carefully cutting out the hand shapes.
Form the Turkey’s Body
Next, have your child trace both of their feet on a larger sheet of brown construction paper. When cut out, these will form the turkey’s body. Glue the two foot shapes together with one slightly higher than the other.
Attach the Hands as Feathers
Take the hand cut-outs and glue them to the back of the turkey’s body in a fanned out pattern to represent feathers. Using different shades of fall colors like red, orange and yellow will give the feathers a nice look.
Add Eye-Catching Decorative Touches
Now comes the fun, creative part! Use construction paper, foam sheets, pom poms, sequins and other materials to add decorative touches:
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Glue on googly eyes or draw cartoon eyes with markers Add an orange beak and red snood (neck flap)
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Write what family members are thankful for on the feather hands.
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Use glitter, sequins, and pom poms to make the feathers pop.
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Give your turkey a bow tie or festive hat.
Let kids customize their turkey hands and express their creativity. Adding special touches makes each turkey unique.
Create a Whole Turkey Family
Once your kids have the basics down, you can create an entire construction paper turkey family. Make small and large hands for baby and daddy turkeys. Give each family member a distinct personality with fun decorations. Display your turkey clan together for a cute Thanksgiving scene!
Additional Turkey Hand Craft Ideas
The possibilities are endless when crafting turkey hands! Here are more ways to create unique turkeys:
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Use sticker eyes instead of gluing on googly eyes
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Attach a popsicle stick to make turkey puppets
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Use colored construction paper for hands and neutral manila paper for the body
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Incorporate natural materials like leaves and feathers
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Make turkeys hold paper hearts, flowers or autumn leaves
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Use fingerprint stamps to make feathers
Developing Skills Through Crafting
Beyond just providing holiday decor, making turkey hands boosts your child’s development in many ways:
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Fine motor skills – cutting, tracing, gluing
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Creativity and self-expression
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Counting and numbers (cutting out a certain number of hands)
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Thankfulness (writing gratitude messages on the feathers)
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Family bonding through quality time
So break out the construction paper and turn little hands into turkeys this Thanksgiving! Follow these simple steps to craft adorable turkey hands with your kids. Then proudly display them around your home and make a Thanksgiving memory.
Handprint Turkey Craft For Kids
- Colored cardstock or construction paper
- Pencil
- Scissors
- Glue stick
- Turkey template
- Download the turkey template, print it, and cut out the pieces.
- Begin by gluing the light brown turkey belly onto the turkeys body.
- Next, glue the turkey beak to the middle of the turkeys head.
- Secure the snood (the red piece) to the top, side of the turkeys beak with glue.
- Now, glue the paper eyeballs or googly eyes to the turkeys head, above the beak.
- Glue the yellow feet onto each side of the bottom of the turkeys body.
- Trace your childs hand onto the colored card stock of your choice (these will be the turkeys feathers) and cut them all out.
- Finish off by fanning out the colored handprints, then glue the completed turkey onto the handprints.
Kids’ Thanksgiving & Turkey Crafts
Making crafts with kids is a great way to practice fine motor skills, engage creativity, and have fun! Add in more with some of our favorite ideas:
Fun Thanksgiving Do A Dot
Pumpkin Craft For Preschoolers – Fall is finally here, so it’s time to break out the pumpkin crafts! This is the perfect craft for young kids, and it’s guaranteed to get them into the spirit of the season. All you need is some construction paper, scissors, and glue.
Turkey Popsicle Stick Craft – This Thanksgiving turkey craft is a fun project for the kids during the holiday season! You can even turn them into a magnet for the fridge, too. They’d make the perfect gift to say ‘Happy Thanksgiving’ to someone special!
Paper Bag Corn Craft – This fun craft is an easy way for kids to show off their imagination and creativity! You only need a brown paper bag, some paper, and glue. Older kids will love cutting out each piece of the printable template, while younger ones can practice their gluing skills.
Disguise A Turkey Printable – It’s that time of year again- time to start thinking about disguising the ol’ turkey! This year, why not try something different and make a Forky, Pikachu, Pete the Cat, or Among Us character? With this printable, these turkey crafts are easy and fun for kids of all ages!
Our Thanksgiving pattern block mats are perfect for getting your kids into STEM educational activities! Each mat features a colorful and playful Thanksgiving theme for kids to complete using their favorite toy blocks. Plus, this activity is great for helping them learn about shapes, patterns, and colors!
Do your little ones love coloring? Then, they’ll love our Thanksgiving color by number printables! This easy, no-prep activity is perfect for keeping little kids busy.
Try this Cheetah Turkey Disguise
As they color in the pages, they can also practice counting and number recognition! These printables are a great way to entertain your kids during the fall season.
Download these Thanksgiving do a dot printables for a fun take on learning. With these pages, kids can learn about counting, shapes, and more – all while having lots of fun! Don’t worry if you don’t have dot markers; kids can use buttons, pom poms, and other fun objects to fill in the gaps instead.
Try our Thanksgiving worksheets for kids to combine traditional education with something a little more creative. With each activity, your kids can develop their fine motor skills, such as practicing handwriting and pattern making. Education doesn’t have to be boring with these fun and engaging worksheets!
Have your kids practice their ABCs with this set of Thanksgiving alphabet worksheets. Each page has fun and festive s to help keep them engaged while learning! From beginning sounds to upper and lower case letters, young learners can practice letter recognition with these seasonal worksheets.
Did you make this activity with your kids or students? We’d love to feature them on our social media!
For a chance to have your child’s project featured, simply snap a picture of the completed project and post it to our Facebook page, email it to us directly by clicking here, or use #simpleeverydaymom on your social media!
How To Make A Paper Turkey Craft For Preschoolers
FAQ
How to make a hand turkey with construction paper?
- Trace your child’s hand on a sheet of blank paper.
- Use the tracing to cut handprints from the red, orange, yellow, and brown construction paper.
- Cut a figure 8 shape from another sheet of brown paper.
- Glue the handprints to the top back of the figure 8 to create turkey feathers.
How to make a turkey out of a paper sack?
- Stuff your turkey as you normally would.
- Open one brown paper bag inside another one.
- Butter the inside of the inside bag real well.
- Put the turkey (in bag) into the roasting rack (rack being inside of roasting pan).
- Bake at 325 F.
- THAT IS IT!
How do you make Turkey hands out of construction paper?
Making turkey hands out of construction paper is simple and requires minimal materials Here is a step-by-step guide Trace Hands – Have your child trace both of their hands on a piece of brown construction paper. Make sure to trace with fingers together and thumbs separated to form the turkey shape. Trace about 5-6 hands.
How do you make a handprint Turkey?
If you’re younger and aren’t sure how to create one, the steps are simple. You can create your turkey by using construction paper or by using finger paint. If you follow the techniques and get creative, you can make a handprint and footprint turkey that you can be proud of. Trace your feet on a piece of construction paper.
How do you decorate a Turkey with construction paper?
Add Color – Now it’s time to decorate! Take construction paper in yellow, orange and red and cut out small hand shapes. Glue these colorful hands amongst the brown to make fun feathers. Add Face – To finish, glue on googly eyes or draw a simple turkey face. Add a beak, wattle and snood with construction paper.
How do you make a Turkey shape?
Trace Hands – Have your child trace both of their hands on a piece of brown construction paper. Make sure to trace with fingers together and thumbs separated to form the turkey shape. Trace about 5-6 hands. Trace Feet – Next, have your child trace both of their feet on a larger piece of brown construction paper.
How do you make a Turkey look cartoon?
Cut two eyes out of white paper, using your black marker to draw in the pupils. Make bigger eyes to give your turkey a more cartoon look. Using orange paper, cut out a triangle for its beak. Finally, using red construction paper cut out a wattle.
How do you draw a Turkey with a pencil?
Trace an outline of your hand. Trace around your hand’s fingers and thumb. The thumb will be the face of your turkey, the hand will represent the body, and your fingers will represent its feathers. You can use any color of pencil you want for the outline, but make sure that the color stands out so people can see it.