Tots and Me... Growing Up Together: Littles Learning Link Up: November 22, 2016

Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Littles Learning Link Up: November 22, 2016 - Improved Thankfulness Turkey Placemats

Each month you will find:

A seasonal round-up (toward the beginning of the month)
A guest post featuring crafts, activities, tips, snack ideas or other early childhood topics. (toward the end of the month)
Posts where I share what I have been up to with my preschoolers and/or early elementary children (including occasional highlight posts where I share how we used ideas that have been linked up here on Littles Learning Link Up).

Each week, I will host a link up, where you can share either what you have been up to recently, or old posts that may go with the theme. Feel free to link up more than one post.

Each week I will continue to feature a couple of posts from those that have been linked up.

I hope you will continue to share your wonderful posts, and I hope you will find something new to try with your child(ren).

It would be great for everyone to stop by and visit the other linked-up posts as well. Check them out, leave some comments, pin those that interest you. Let's make this a real party and socialize with each other.

What have we been up to?

We have been visiting Mexico with MFW ECC (Exploring Countries and Cultures). I hope to be sharing more about that soon. The children loved using their passports and pretending to fly in an airplane to get to Mexico City. We have been trying to do our calendar time in Spanish. We are getting ready to celebrate with a fiesta, which will probably just be Taco Tuesday tonight for dinner with some decorations. We are making a pinata, but won't be breaking it yet as we are making it into a turkey to help decorate for Thanksgiving.

We have also been reading about the desert and rocks, plus lots of Thanksgiving books. You can see some of my favorites in last week's round up: Celebrating Thanksgiving Through Literature.

Today I would like to share my improved design for Thankfulness Turkey Placemats. We made something similar last year, but I thought they were kind of plain. So, this year I spruced them up a bit. Once again, I did this craft with the children in the co-op preschool class.

Thankfulness Turkey Placemats

For each child you will need a sheet of red, orange, or yellow construction paper (their choice)

A piece of white paper that is a bit bigger, so there is a border.

(I cut my paper from a pad of large paper, making sure there would be a 1 inch border)

Brown construction paper

Leaves cut out from red, orange, and yellow construction paper

(I printed a simple leaf template directly on the paper and cut them out)

Glue sticks

Crayons in fall colors.

Contact paper

The first thing I did was trace the children's hands on brown paper, one of each hand. While the children worked on their placemats, we cut out the hands.

They chose the color of construction paper they wanted, then they glued it to the white paper.

Then they were given the crayons to decorate the border.

When they were finished, they glued the leaves around the border. The adults came around and glued their hand turkeys on for them. If we had had more time, they would have glued them on themselves, but we were limited this week because it was our last week of co-op for the fall session and we were getting ready to have our Harvest Lunch.

When they were done gluing on the leaves, they were to give their turkeys some facial features and feet, and color the tail feathers.

Unfortunately, I did NOT get a picture of all the finished placemats because parents were coming in to pick up their children for the dinner. Here area few of them.

After they were all done, we put contact paper on the back and front to keep them protected. Harold's is the only one I took a final picture for because we have their names on them with the Bible verse.

Let's take a look at that review schedule:

Well, there is nothing on the schedule for Homeschool Review Crew reviews. I posted my last review a couple of weeks ago, it was for the Language Smarts Level E book from the The Critical Thinking Co.™ . Though I have no current reviews for the Homeschool Review Crew, I do still have some children's books I will be posting reviews and giveaways for, plus I am still working on some Single Product Reviews that get posted on the Old Schoolhouse Magazine website.

I'm thrilled to be able to share that I have been accepted back on the Crew for the 2017 Crew year! I am so excited!! So, I will be able to continue bringing you reviews of wonderful products next year.

A few somethings I would like to share with you:

My Thanksgiving-themed Round Ups

Thanksgiving Round Up

Celebrating Thanksgiving Through Literature

(in addition to the 10 books that I share about the "First" Thanksgiving,

there is a round up of Thanksgiving Books lists and some craft ideas)

Don't miss these reviews and giveaways:

Cityblock Children's Board Book and Where Jesus Slept Children's Book

I am still lining up guest posts. If you would be interested writing a guest post for Littles Learning Link Up one of these months, please leave a comment or contact me via my contact info on my About Me page. I will need to have your email address so I can contact you. I am looking for posts that have to do with young children: crafts, activities, foods/snacks, tips, or other ideas. I am open to suggestions.

Now onto:

Littles Learning Link Up Features

On my last Littles Learning Link Up post, there were 14 wonderful posts linked up. I will be picking one randomly selected post to share, plus the top clicked-on posts.

Please don't forget to stop by other posts that are linked up. See what catches your eye, stop by, pin the post to a relevant board, and perhaps leave a comment to let the author of the blog know you have been by for a visit. I know I appreciate others commenting and letting me know they have read my posts, so I am sure others do too.

This week's randomly selected post is:

Tara from Homeschool Preschool shared 25 of the Best Educational Board Games For Preschoolers.

And here are this week's top clicked on posts.

There are 3 of them this week!

Amanda from Sicily's Heart & Home shared Books We're Reading This Thanksgiving.

Nancy from Mimi and the Grands shared More Thanksgiving Books: A Unit Study.

Ayelet from Strength in Words shared Episode 36: Infant-Directed Speech.

Join the Party!

I would love to have you join in this week! What sort of activities do you do with your young children? Do you have some favorite activities you would like to share? I invite you to link up below. I will be pinning posts on one of my relevant boards, and I would love to feature some of the activities each week from what is linked up.

Please know I may share a picture from your post and link back to it, along with sharing how we used your idea in our school time. By linking up you are giving me permission to use a picture from your post. I will ALWAYS give credit and link back. Additionally, if you choose to try out any of the ideas with your child, please make sure you give credit where credit is due.

Linky will be open through Monday night, to give me time to check out all the posts and get the Features organized. Please take the time to visit some of the other wonderful posts linked up.