Give Thanks: Make a Cornucopia Table Setting

A cornucopia is the traditional table decoration of Thanksgiving. Usually, it’s filled with pumpkins, gourds and leaves to celebrate the bounty of autumn and harvest-time, but a cornucopia can also be a terrific catalyst to get your kids thinking about all the things they’re grateful for. Let all your Thanksgiving guests join the celebration by slipping their own thank-yous into the cornucopia before the meal.

With this activity, your child will get to practice reading and writing while keeping her holiday spirit alive! And when she's done, she'll have made a festive decoration for all of your guests to enjoy.

What you need:

• Cornucopia-shaped basket (available at craft stores, such as Michael’s)
• Construction paper in autumn colors (red, brown, orange, yellow)
• Markers
• Scissors
• Gourds, pumpkins, Indian corn and other harvest items

What to do:

1. Help your child cut leaves from the construction paper. There’s no “right” leaf shape, but it can be fun to collect leaves from your yard or from around your neighborhood and copy their shapes. Your child can also practice symmetry by folding a piece of paper in half before cutting, drawing half of a leaf shape and then cutting it out. When she opens it up, she'll have a completely symmetrical leaf shape.
2. Keep cutting! You’ll want to cut out around 20 to 50 leaves.
3. This is a project the whole family can do together! Divvy the leaves up among your family members—save a handful for any Thanksgiving guests you might have coming over for dinner. Each person will use markers to write one thing he or she is thankful for on each leaf. Each person can make as many thank you leaves as he likes!
4. When you’re done, scatter the leaves in and around the cornucopia and fill the basket with the harvest items.  

For extra practice, have your child read some of the thank yous aloud before Thanksgiving dinner!