Are you a turkey?

I made an A-B-C turkey bingo game. I drew a simple figure of a turkey with tail feathers spanned and printed an alphabet letter on each feather. I told the class that instead of shouting "bingo" they had to shout gobble-gobble.

I designed the game so that all children would "bingo" at the same time. When a dozen little darlings realized that they were one away from winning, the excitement was palpable, the noise level rising, and then, I called the final letter. You should have heard those birds.
"Cock-a-doodle-doo!"
"Bawk-bawk!"
"Cacka-caka!"
"Tweet-tweet!"

Not one turkey in the class. Each of them looked at me for validation that they were correct. I merely sat and looked at them with no expression. They were confused. Then I said, "Gobble-gobble" and they all repeated after me like a gaggle of wild gobblers. I smiled approvingly and they all got up to wait in line to dig in the prize box.

Their responses and their air of superiority and confidence that THEY were the only RIGHT one, reminded me of the way many bird-brained people express their political points of view. They tweet, cackle, cock-a-doodle and bawk-bawk their opinions all over Facebook and the Internet, convinced that they have THE RIGHT ANSWER and everyone else is wrong.

My bet is, if I had "cock-a-doodled" the students would have followed along.

I strive to teach my students to respect diversity and one another and to seek peace. What the world needs now...