Featured Gratitude Sparkler Content

It’s time for pumpkins, apples, falling leaves — and saying “Thank you!”

How can families learn about saying “Thanks” as we approach Thanksgiving?

Sparkler offers families tips for parents as well as 2,000+ off-screen play-based learning activities, organized by themes and skills. Each Sparkler activity is designed to inspire active learning through play, because children learn best when they are free to explore, experiment, and engage their whole bodies.

We regularly share lists of featured activities with our program partners to help you identify activities you might want to share with families via our Library (or use in your classrooms) to promote development. This month, we are highlighting Thanksgiving and gratitude activities! Providers who are using Sparkler can find and share these activities directly from the Library tab in your Sparkler dashboard.

Tips for Parents

Growing Gratitude

November is Gratitude Month! The Tip for Adults titled “Growing Gratitude” offers parents these five tips to help their child develop Gratitude and Kindness.

Try saying, “Thank You” instead of, “Good Job” to their child.
Make giving a habit and talk about how their tiny acts of generosity impact others.
Modeling gratitude by saying, “Thank you” to your neighborhood helpers.
Less is more: donate or put excess toys out of sight for a while.
Say “No” or “Not Today” to their child sometimes.

Read more in the app! You can find and share this parenting tip under the Library tab on the provider dashboard.

Featured Play Activities

G-G-Grateful Song (all ages)

I’m thankful for the trees and for our home … and for YOU! What are you thankful for?

Let’s use the track for “G-G-Grateful” to compose our own Thanksgiving song about the people, places, and things we’re grateful for.
Let’s sing it together to share what we’re thankful for!

Cornbread Chef (18 months – 5 years old)

Cornbread is a food that some families share on Thanksgiving. Let’s bake our own together. Let’s preheat the oven to 400ºF degrees. Now, let’s work together to measure and mix all of the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl: 1 cup cornmeal, 1 cup flour, 1 tsp salt, 1 tbsp baking powder, 4 tsp sugar.

Now let’s work together to measure and mix the wet ingredients: 1 egg, 1 cup milk, ¼ cup oil or melted butter. Then let’s mix wet and dry together. Finally, let’s mix in 1 cup of corn kernels.

Let’s pour the batter into a greased baking pan and I’ll put it into the oven for 20-25 minutes (15-20 minutes for muffins). Let’s share our cornbread!

Who Needs It? (for children 18 months – 5 years)

Let’s look through our home for items to donate to someone else. We can look in the closet, in your toy bin, and on the bookshelf. (Toddlers can simply drop donations into a box!)

Let’s sort our items into two categories: items to keep and use and items to donate for someone else to use.
When we’re done, let’s count the number of items to donate. Let’s deliver the items to a local charity!