Teaching good manners is a topic that I have been thinking about for awhile. Reminders like “Use a napkin, not your shirt” and “How can you ask that in a nice, polite way?” and “Use your fork, please” are heard often in our home. So I was very excited to find a FHE lesson on Manners at A Year of FHE.
I mostly just followed the lesson as outlined by Emilie. We talked about the magic words of please and thank you and we sang this cute little song:
(Sung to I’m a Little Teapot)
I have super manners. Yes, I do.
I can say “Please,” and “Thank You,” too.
When I play with friends, I like to share.
That’s the way I show I care!
Then we read Time to Say “Please” by Mo Willems. We’ve had this book out from the library for over a month now. Anything by Mo Willems is always a hit at our house, so this book has been a good tool for reminders about saying please and thank you. 
Then we moved on to the topic of Table Manners. For our family, we have decided to focus on two:
Always use your tools to eat your food.
Clean with a napkin.
I made a little poster with some visual aids to help us all remember!
To wrap things up, the girls colored the mini book of manners that Emilie shared. 
As they colored, we read and discussed What do you say, dear? by Sesyle Joslin, with pictures by Maurice Sendak.
This book was written in the 1950s as “A handbook of etiquette for young ladies and gentlemen. To be used as a guide for everyday social behavior”. What we have really enjoyed about this book is that even though the hypothetical situations the children face are often bizzare and quite imaginative, there is still a place for manners. For example, “You are picking dandelions and columbines outside the castle. Suddenly a fierce dragon appears and blows red smoke at you, but just then a brave knoght gallops up and cuts off the dragon’s head. What do you say, dear?” And the answer of course, as you turn the page is, “Thank you very much”.
Adding to our Family Habits List
Use your manners. Be polite. is the sixth habit we have added to our Family Habits list. To read more about the habits we are working on in our family, read this post.