Turkey on the Table is a word game that requires memory as well as coming up with words associated with the Thanksgiving celebration. One student begins the game by stating, "I am the turkey on the table, and I have apples on the table. What did you bring?" The next student has to repeat the complete phrase and add on another item that would be likely to be on a Thanksgiving table. Your Dictionary has this and other word game suggestions.
Word search games using Thanksgiving as a theme will help students learn to spell and recognize the written word. This type of game has the words hidden among other letters; the student has to find the words listed on the bottom of the sheet. Apples 4 the Teacher has a computerized version of a word search that students may enjoy playing as a reward. There are free printable word search games on Kaboose.com that are rated by skill level from beginner to advanced.
Once students have had the opportunity to learn some facts about Thanksgiving, you can play a trivial pursuit game using those facts as questions rather than the questions that come with the game. An example of a question could be "Who wanted the turkey to be our national bird?" The answer is Benjamin Franklin.
With older students you could even make this game into a project by asking each of them to find a fact about Thanksgiving that they could ask the other students. There is a video about Thanksgiving that you can play on History.com. After the students watch the video, ask them to come up with a trivial pursuit question to use. 1-800 Flowers.com has a list of fun facts about Thanksgiving that could be included.
Using words or phrases and mixing them up creates anagrams. Create a list of Thanksgiving-related words and write them on the board. Challenge students to create their own anagrams by building phrases using the same words. An example of an anagram is the word "comics": You may make the word "cosmic" from the same letters. There are two printable Thanksgiving anagram worksheets available on DLTK's.