T is for Thanksgiving and Trains

We had a really big day today with lots of fun. Since it's already Christmas at the Magic Kingdom, I figured we might as well get a jump on learning about Thanksgiving. We did several Thanksgiving songs and finger plays this morning and ended up singing one in particular all day long. We'll keep practicing and maybe Peyton will have a live performance to share later in the week.

We built a pilgrim village with Lincoln Logs. (It was later demolished by a tornado...we happened to talk about tornadoes in the car yesterday and it was apparently still fresh in Peyton's head.)

Next we practiced playing (oatmeal container) drums like the Native Americans. Peyton and I went back and forth copying each other's patterns. Jack was just happy to bang on a drum.

Playing the drums

We made an awesome turkey craft using coffee filters and Jack had lots of fun making his own. You color the filters with markers then dip them gently in water so you can watch the colors bleed. They were dry in a couple hours and ready to become turkey feathers.

While I was working on lunch, Peyton practiced numbers and counting on ABC Mouse. We have a free trial for now, but he really likes it so it may be something with stick with for this year at least.

Computer time

Since Thanksgiving and turkey have a common letter, we did our letter T page today. Peyton kept wanting to add stickers for words that had T in the middle or end as well, but I got him to stick to those that start with T or else our book is going to get pretty confusing!

Turtle, tiger, turkey, tree, tent, truck, "T", trumpet, treasure

My favorite part of this activity was when we found a page of Thanksgiving stickers. Peyton recognized the Mayflower, the pilgrims, and the pilgrim's houses. He was so excited he said "These tell the story we're learning!"

Since Peyton loves trains and it also starts with "T", we did some train activities today, too. We read these books and then Peyton brought me the pieces to help him make a train. The design was entirely his. I just helped tape. 

After reading the books, Peyton reminded me to get out our story cube and answer a question, so that's a big hit.

Peyton also made an oil car for his train. He asked me to take this picture. I asked him why the train wasn't pulling the oil car behind it and he said it's shunting the oil car instead.