Tot School: Thanksgiving

~Caden is 22.5 Months~

Practical Life

Due to Thanksgiving, we didn’t do a lot of tot school, but we did a lot of life learning. Caden has really taken to washing dishes. Every morning as he rolls up his sleeves, drags a chair or stool over to the sink and asks Daddy “Hands?”  which is Caden code for “Can we wash dishes?”.

Tot Trays

I set up a few Thanksgiving themed tot trays this week, but Caden had little interest in them despite my best efforts to show them to him.

The first one was a sticker tray which works the fine motor muscles of the hands. I cut out a large letter T from construction paper and provided Thanksgiving themed stickers.

The second tray was a magnet board with a turkey dot page from 3 Dinosaurs Thanksgiving Pack. Caden was supposed to fill in the dots with magnetic pom-poms, but he was only interested in spreading the pom-poms all over the room.

The third tray is a foam sheet turkey with clothes pin feathers. The purpose of this tray is to work fine motor muscles by clipping the “feather” onto the turkey. I created this tray by combining ideas from H is for Homeschooling and Joyfully Weary. I put a lot of effort into creating this tot tray and I really thought Caden would like it, so I am a little disappointed that he wasn’t interested.

Here is an update on the Clothespin Feathers Turkey!

Book Bin

Caden enjoyed the books in the bin this week. Partly because he likes the characters (Curious George and Clifford) in the books, and partly because the books are short and simply written. I particularly enjoyed reading Happy Thanksgiving, Curious George because it is written in rhyme.

Arts & Crafts

I had a few cute Thanksgiving craft projects planned, but we only got to one. On Thanksgiving morning Caden and Daddy made a turkey collage (sorta). I had pre-cut a turkey and feathers from construction paper and the plan was for Caden to glue the pieces onto paper. But Caden doesn’t quite understand how to use glue so Daddy helped him (a little too much). But they made a cute turkey!

We got off to a good start!

Then Daddy took over, and Caden got distracted by the pumpkin. (I’m working on them.)

The finished product!

Sensory

Caden and I play with play dough almost every day. This week made brown play dough and added some feathers, colored craft sticks and large googly eyes to the play dough table and we created some funky turkeys!

Ever see a three-eyed turkey?

Now you have!

Fun & Games

The holidays give ample opportunity for lots of fun and games and I plan on taking full advantage!

This week Caden had a great time at his Gymboree class! Since last week (his first class since we took a break for the summer) Caden has developed socially. During class he kicked a ball to another little boy, tried to put a hat on a little girl and said “bye” to everyone at the end of class. He even participated during “circle time”. He would come to the mat and check out what everyone was doing and then run off to play on the equipment again. He was so cute! I can’t wait for next weeks class.

We had some nice warm weather this week, so we took the opportunity to outside in the sunny, fresh air while it lasts. Caden had fun running, jumping, and sliding in the leaves.

I planned to have some fun with these turkey pins that I saw on Make and Takes, but it didn’t happen. These pins are really cute, but they are not for perfectionists. It was a challenge for me to tape the feathers on just right, and then the bowling pins (we have cheap ones from Wal-Mart) were top-heavy and would not stay standing. Add a rambunctious toddler who just wants crash into them and knock them down didn’t help my cause either.

Thanksgiving morning was a laid-back morning. We turned the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV and Caden watched it for a few minutes. The Elf musical segment caught his eye, then he was off getting into something else.

I tried a new blog format today. What do you think?

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