Giving your ESL class Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is often likened to the Korean Chuseok

Chuseok is a day when Korean families gather to eat lots of foods specific to the holiday and visit the graves of passed relatives in memorium. For my classes, I couldn't have them do or make anything, so instead I shared this Thanksgiving powerpoint that I got off of waygook.org and modified.

 Download Powerpoint here

My presentation took about 8 minutes as I went through the vocabulary and explained some of the
dishes.

Korean kids love food, make no mistakes on that. The pictures of foods alone will get them.

 I explained the dishes and where it's words stem from in relation:

• Mashed (potatoes) : potatoes are mashed so that they are soft
  .
• Stuff(ing): We call stuffing "stuffing" because we take it and STUFF it into the turkey. We fill the turkey with it so when we cut it open, it is there.
  .
• Cranberry sauce: It's like a cherry pie filling. But the cranberries are the same size as blueberries. So it's a berry.

Politically correct terms vs. relatable terms

The hardest part for me was determining the word to use for Native American Indian. Obviously Native American is a politically correct word, but it's not something they'll relate to as much as Indian. Sorry. It felt like a bit of a tongue twister and I used both words which may have been a bit confusing.

While I didn't get around to using this video, I did get to pass out my Peanuts Thanksgiving stickers which I was thrilled about.  Nevertheless, if you have more time in your classes you might want to show a part of this.


Peanuts on Thanksgiving history