Apples, Apples, Everywhere!

My kids this year are SO very much into non-fiction stories. I LOVE IT!!! We started our week of apples with a KWL. I set out this little KWL and fill it out with the kids as we go along…

After reading a few short non-fiction books about apples, we filled out the “What You LEARNED” apple and had the kids complete their own KWL to keep in their Reader’s Response Journals. They LOVED this activity! I told them to choose 1 thing from each apple to write down.

KWL Printable: APPLE KWL

And we labeled the parts of an apple…

I also had the kids fill out their own version.  I found it on Mrs. Nelson’s Apple Unit Page.

We also start out the week by adding new poems to our poetry folders. Since we were talking about apples and Johnny Appleseed this week, we added 3 new apple poems to our folders. I give the kids a week to take their poetry folders home and practice reading poetry to their families. The following Friday, I have a “Poetry Parent” come in and pull kids one-by-one into the hallway to recite their poems aloud. If the kids are able to recite their poems {from memory}, they get an Oscar! They also have the choice to opt out of poetry recitation, but they very RARELY do!

Click the link below to download the apple poems I created for our poetry folders.

APPLE POEMS

MATH TUBS & WHOLE GROUP ACTIVITIES

I set out a few apple themed math tubs for the kids to work on this week, too.

 

Click the links to DOWNLOAD the math tub activities.

Odds & Evens Apple Trees

Apple Pie Addition

Just Ripe Math

3 Way Apple Math

POPCORN WORDS {aka: Sight Words, Words To Know, Wow Words}

Again, I forgot my camera to take pics of this one, but this is just a really simple high frequency word puzzle activity that the kids really enjoyed. I gave them a list of words to find, and they matched up the apple puzzles to make the words. They used the “I Know A Bunch Of Words” recording sheet to jot down the words they created. I placed the apple puzzles in a basket underneath our ficus tree :)

Click to download.

APPLE {High Frequency Word} PUZZLES

At the end of the week, we kicked off fall, and said “goodbye” to summer by making applesauce with the kids.

OMG…SO GOOD!!!! My class smelled like FALL all day!

After we started the applesauce making process, we followed up with a few different activities.

*Labeled the objects and ingredients we used to make the applesauce.

*Sequenced the steps to making applesauce. They colored, cut, and glued the pics in the correct order.

*Weighed, measured, graphed apples according to teacher direction.

We made stained glass apples for our windows, too! I used clear contact paper and tissue paper for this activity and the kids were LOVING every single second! I’ve got an artsy little group of girls that love stuff like this! They all “oooohed” and “aaaahhhhed” once they were hanging in the windows. I have to say that they really are pretty dang cute! I don’t wanna take ‘em down!

At the end of the day, we celebrated the end of another week with our special applesauce snack. My favorite part was when one of my sweet girls said, “I don’t like this applesauce, Mrs. Carroll. I LOOOOOOOOOOOVE IT! This is the best thing I’ve ever put in my mouth!” So dang cute! HA! As they were finishing up, I had the kids conduct a survey to find out who did and didn’t like the applesauce. They had to record and graph the data and then we talked about our results before we left to go home. Happy to say that only 1 little guy didn’t particularly enjoy the flavors.

After they ate their applesauce, I handed each student a recipe to take home to their parents. It was a FUN, apple filled week in First Grade!!!

You can download the applesauce recipe, apple measurment activity, applesauce labeling sheet, and apple sequencing activity by clicking HERE.