It may also be a good idea to decide where, in your home, your Thanksgiving party will take place.

When you are a home schooling family, holidays take on a whole new meaning. You are able to study and prepare for the holiday while enjoying time with your children. Thanksgiving is no exception. Beyond the benefits of having your children in the kitchen strengthening there math skills, Thanksgiving is an excellent time to learn about American history, appreciation of people and things around us and to work in some Bible lessons on thankfulness. You can learn about 1621 being the first Thanksgiving celebration. You can then take all your newfound knowledge and turn it into a Thanksgiving trivia game to play while you are eating dinner.

For a craft project you and your children can make prizes for all your friends and family who play Thanksgiving trivia with you. You can make a big turkey for the most wrong answers and you can make a pilgrims hat for the most correct and then use your imagination for the rest of the prizes. For a special activity that your family and friends can participate in you can take a plain white tablecloth and markers and write what you are thankful for.

Then you have each of your guests write on the tablecloth what they are thankful for. At the end of the day you will be able to read what everyone wrote. If you save the tablecloth for next year you can make this an annual tradition. It is a great deal of fun to read what everyone had on his or her minds last year. For young children you can teach about cornucopias by making individual cornucopias out of construction paper.

Then you can fill the cornucopias with popcorn, oranges, apples and nuts. If you leave these out and accessible your children will be delighted to have a healthy snack to eat. The joy of reaching into a cornucopia that they made will encourage them to choose healthy alternatives to all the extra Halloween candy still lying around the house.

If you are feeling really creative have your children make placemats for each person who will be eating with you on Thanksgiving. The children can personalize each placemat with what they are thankful for about that particular guest. For example they can say they are thankful that grandma always brings plenty of hugs to dinner, or that grandpa always has a pocket full of change just waiting to pass out quarters.