Apples Galore

This week we learned a lot about apples.  We kicked off our week of apple fun with a trip to the apple orchard.  Students and their families were invited to meet our teacher team at the apple orchard last Sunday afternoon.  We found that Sunday works better than Saturday due to a large soccer league in our city.  The orchard staff does short presentation, then families are invited to pick apples at their leisure.  Families are responsible for transportation, supervision of their children and the cost of the apples they pick.  We are a high poverty district (we qualify for no cost lunch for all), yet still have a pretty good turn out!

Monday morning we put the apples I picked to good use by making applesauce.  I peeling and cored all the apples Sunday afternoon, then students were in charge of cutting the apples into pieces and putting them into the crockpot.  After cooking down the apples, we added some brown sugar and cinnamon.  At the end of the day, we tasted delicious applesauce.

We worked on a little apple book throughout the week.  I purchased a lapbook pack on TpT.  I modified to what I thought we could handle.  We worked on it a little bit at a time throughout the week.

The flap on the right has the season of the tree, but this student was absent today and I sent everyone else's home before taking photos.  The kids were so proud of this little activity.

We created these little cuties from First Grade Blue Skies at the art center. I didn't give them any patterns other than the stems which were just cut strips of brown paper.  I taught them how to round the corners of a piece of construction paper and created an example in front of the class before setting them loose for the week at the art center. There was also green paper available, but it wasn't a popular apple color. I didn't do glyphs or anything, just an art project for them to do independently.  The "noses" you see are magnets I made to hang their artwork on our chalkboard.

Today we had caramel apples for a snack.  I precut the apples into slices.  When it was time to snack, we dried the apple slices with a paper towel, and I cut a small slit into the apple then inserted a popsicle stick into the slice.  My kiddos dipped their slice into a tub of caramel sauce then sprinkles or mini chocolate chips.  Who knew: every kid ate the skin on their apple today!

It was a great week of learning about apples!  What kind of fun did you have this week?  Next week we'll be learning about our 5 senses, taking a trip to the local Nature Center and its picture day.