Talk to the children about the four ships that carried the first pilgrims to America in the 1600s - the Mayflower, Fortune, Anne and Little James. Show children pictures of the ships and have them draw pictures of one of the ships crossing the sea. Or, create pilgrim ship cutouts from construction paper and help children glue them onto blue construction paper to represent the sea. Give the children stickers to decorate the water with fish and the boats with people. Look for Thanksgiving-themed stickers so that children can place pilgrim hats on the people aboard their ships. Help the children write the names of the ships on the sides of the cutouts.
Around Thanksgiving time, discuss how difficult the journey would have been for pilgrims to cross the ocean in the 17th century and how harsh the conditions would have been upon landing. Talk with the children about what they would do if they landed on a strange land and had to build their own homes and cultivate crops to make it through long, cold winters without heating. Help them think of how happy and grateful they would be for a plentiful harvest in the first fall after living in America. Create blank cards for them and encourage them to draw a picture on the front of a big feast. Have them put pilgrims in their characteristic black hats next to the feast. On the inside of the card, write down things that each child says he is thankful for. Ask them to share the cards with their families around Thanksgiving and to be thankful for all that they have.
A handmade pilgrim hat craft is an engaging art project for pre-school age children to participate in. Use a large paper plate, black paint or crayons, grey streamers, glue, aluminum foil and scissors to create the hat. Help the children cut a hole into the center of the paper plate so that it takes up almost the entire eating surface. Paint the remaining plate rim black. Help each child wrap a large piece of black construction paper around itself so the ends touch. Staple or glue the ends together, forming a cylinder. Attach the cylinder to the rim with tape or glue. Wrap a grey streamer along the base of the hat and tape a folded piece of foil to the front. Color the foil with yellow paint to create a buckle. Let everything dry then encourage children to wear their hats for a class picture that you can print off and give to parents.
There's not a lot of pilgrim art around today because the pilgrims were so busy trying to survive that most didn't have time to develop significant bodies of work that could be sold and collected by others. Talk about what a day in the life of a pilgrim might have been like and then encourage children to draw pictures of activities like sowing seeds, harvesting crops, making hats or other clothes, hunting for food, digging wells or building homes.