This learning experience is best suited for use in one of the early primary grades (kindergarten, first or second), depending on the ability level of the students.  The purpose of this learning experience is to improve students’ writing skills, with reference to the construction of a grammatically correct thank-you note (composed of a greeting, a message at least one complete sentence in length, and a closing).  The students in this class have been previously introduced to the format of a letter, and thus this learning experience will reinforce the concept.  It also encourages them to practice the use of a writing strategy employed in the classroom, COPS (Capitalization, Overall appearance, Punctuation, Spelling), and to discover resources, within the classroom, that could assist them in their writing endeavors, and guide them as they build on their abilities as peer reviewers/editors. 

     The experience also encompasses a more affective goal, in that it sets forth to provide students with the opportunity to think about what, in their lives, they are truly thankful for.  This concept ties in with the unit, which would concurrently be under discussion in the classroom, Thanksgiving.  This learning experience, while it was used to assess writing skills, is applicable to other skill areas as well.  If desired, an educator could use it to develop fine motor skills other than writing as well, such as tracing, cutting, and pasting because, within the learning experience, students must trace, cut, and then paste portions of the turkey which appears on the cover of the thank-you note.

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