Apples Unit & Johnny Appleseed

I am also planning a celebration next week for John's B-day. This will kick-off my unit on Fall Harvest. I'm sending home a note to parents this Friday asking them to send in an apple of their child's choice. We will use the apples for sorting by color, size, etc. and we'll graph our sorting results; we'll cut some of them up for stamping with yellow, red, and green paint; and in Kindergarten Cafe we'll make applesauce and apple butter. I have Disney's version of Johnny Appleseed on video and an audio version by someone else to listen to during rest time. We always make Johnny Appleseed Pot Hats by cutting a strip of black construction paper that is 6" wide by the circumfrence of the child's head (you'll have to splice 2 pieces together). Make a pot handle from 2" x 6" strip of brown paper. Staple the black strip together to form a ring to fit each child's head. Glue the handle on and add an apple cut-out made from red paper. If we have time, we'll make apple tarts from canned biscuit dough flattened out with canned apple pie filling placed on one half. Fold the other half over, seal the edge and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake at 425 degrees (I use a toaster oven) until golden brown. Yum!
Hope these ideas help you out,
Sandy

I was looking for new ideas for this week as well. I know these are late but maybe for next year. On his birthday we have planned center activities.
1.Bob for apples
2. Apple core mobile - white consruction paper for shape of core, red or green top and bottom and black paper for seeds.
3. Video clip of Legends video from Disney about Johnny appleseed
4. Pampered Chef apple pealer and corer to cut apples, chop with plastic knives, place in crock pot to cook all night on low to make applesauce.
5. Make tree shape, trace around arm from elbow to fingers for trunk and add paint on sponges for leaves and fingerprints for apples on the tree
6. graph favorite apple. Each group will be blindfoled and given a piece of red, green, and yellow apple. Each child will choose their favorite apple. Will make graph of apples shapes to show class favorite apple.

We also plan to write a big book in the shape of an eaten apple core with a red top and bottom. We write together. Each child contributes a sentence on chart paper. Discuss beginning, middle, end, conflict and resolution. Write child's name and number of sentence on paper. Cut chart apart and give each child a sentence strip to write the sentence on and a white apple core page to glue the sentence strip and to illustrate book. This will be a story of an adventure with Johnny Appleseed.

We also discuss tall tales and write individual tall tales about ourselves. We make puppets of Johnny Appleseed and read the story to younger grades. We have more ideas if you want them. These might be too many!

I have used these topics before in creative writing... If I was the first apple to fall off the tree I would.... If I was the last apple left on the apple tree I would.... Here's what I would do if I was an appple so I would be the first one picked..... This can be varied in many ways. The kids get a kick out of it & so do I!!!!

I make apple mobiles with my first graders during our apple unit.
Here's what we do:
Have cut out ahead of time:
-die-cut apple shapes in green, red and yellow
-2.5 inch lengths of yarn for each student

Each student picks out 5 die cut apples. They need to create a pattern (for example: yellow, red, yellow, red, yellow, red..... or green, red, red, green, red red....you get the point!). They need to be able to verbally tell you their pattern and tell you what would come next if they were able to select 7 apples, or 8 apples.....
The students will write a sentence on their 5 apples. As a class, brainstorm words to describe an apple. I always bring in apples for the kids to eat (red, green and yellow) and find that they are able to come up with some wonderful descriptive words. Write all of the words on the board (or sentence strips). Now the students need to write a sentence...A ____,____,____ apple. For example: A big, red, juicy apple or A crunchy, sour, yellow apple. The students just select words from the word bank to fit in their sentence. After you have checked their sentences, they write each word on an apple cut-out.
When they are finished, you string their apple cut-outs through the yarn to make a hanging moblile (vertical). I hang them from the ceiling-great compliment to the room's decor during the apple unit.
Hope this helps!

We do our apple unit around Sept 27 (Johnny Appleseed b'day) and also learn about John McIntosh, our Canadian apple grower whom the popular "Mac" is named after. As part of our apple unit, we travel to a nearby grocery store. The produce manager explains how they store/protect their apples, what each kind tastes like, is best for (raw eating, cooking, pie)and what country they come from. Sometimes that explains the price differences. We taste different apple snacks there - apple chips, dried fruit leather). Then each child chooses one apple and they run it thru a cash register one at a time. (I bring small brown bags, one each) I record the child's name, kind of apple, and apple cost on the bag, put the apple in, then give it to a parent volunteer who carries 10 per grocery bag back to the school. If the children carry them, you have a lot of bruised apples. Sometimes the store donates the apple cost, sometimes I pay for it and the store gives each child a treat bag with applesauce, fruit leather, apple juice. At school we graph the apples by color, type, and cost, recording on several different graphs for display. We compare their apple on a balance scale (heavier or lighter than the teachers apple) and estimate circumference with yarn. The yarn is displayed under "too short, just right, too long" headers. I do the "star" story and we cut my apple to discover the star, and count the seeds. They predict if their apple will have more or less seeds than mine before we cut to find their star. We use portion cups to make a table top display of # of seeds, then we add together for a BIG number. Then we peel and cut the apples for homemade apple sauce, with parent help. We taste test apple snacks and decide which we like best for another graph, and eat the applesauce. All is recorded in an apple shaped book, including apple poems and songs as well as results of all the graphing.

I teach Gr 1. After several other math activities with the apples, I tell the story of the star inside and apple, then we open mine to see the star and also count the seeds. Each child estimates the number of seeds in their apple and we cut theirs so they can see the star, take out the seeds, and graph the numbers we find.

Then we pack the 1/2 apples off to the kitchen with a volunteer parent or two, who peel the apples. Meanwhile we're learning the recipe
"Peel an apple, cut it up, put it in a pot.
When you taste it you will find
Its applesauce you've got"
(to the tune of "Yankee Doodle")

When the apples are peeled, groups of 4 children go to the kitchen and are supervised as they use regular (dull) dinner knives to cut some of the apples into chunks and put them into a big pot with a water in the bottom. They also get a chance to stir the pot. As more groups go in to cut, and add to the pot, they report back to use that the apples in it are getting soft, darker, and very fragrant. The apples cook slowly, and we stir occasionally, repeating the song/recipe. When we cant stand the delicious smell any longer, we add a bit of sugar and quite a bit of cinnamon, and share it while its warm.

We also have to share with the secretary and principal, as they've been smelling it for hours ! Hope this is what you were looking for.

I have the kids bring in an apple or two. One is usually enough because some take a long time to peel it! Using table knives or plastic knives I have them peel their apple. They usually eat the peelings while we're doing it! Then I cut it into fourths and they trim out the core. Then we put it in the crockpot and with a little water. I'm not sure how much. It depends on how many apples you have. Just enough to almost cover the apples. Cook on low for 3-4 hours. Stir every so often to mush up the apples and to check its progress. When they are soft and mushy it's done. You can add sugar to taste and cinnamon now, or you can add it right away before you cook it. I start with about a quarter cup sugar and a 1 t of cinnamon and then you can add to taste. It makes your room smell soooo good! Other classes will want to know what you're up to! When it's time to eat, caution the kids that it's really hot because it can burn their mouths.Enjoy!

*Read Johnny Appleseed by Steven Kellogg.(you might even want to get the same story by another author and compare the stories)

*List food made from apples (applesauce, apple pie, apple juice, apple dumplings, etc.)and taste some of each.

*Graph the students favorite apple food.

*Bring in different types of apples. Have students describe each apple's properties(color, shape, taste,etc.) Then graph favorites.

*Do apple prints (cutting apple to expose the star shape inside).

* On the veggies, Julianne listed a lot of great activities. Also, after showing several veggies, talk about root, stem, flower, leaf and put the veggies under each category.

*To show how stems take up the water to the parts of a plant, take a stalk of celery and place it in colored water. Have students predict what will happen. Check the celery the next day (and maybe even the next day) and discuss what happened.

* Hope these help. Have Fun!

I have used this idea for apples for the last two years.
On or around Johnny Appleseed's birthday, Sept. 26, we talk about different kinds of apples. (I have several children's books about apples) We also talk about Johnny Appleseed and I read a book about him. I give each student a medium-size apple that I've pealed. I've also cut two slits for eyes (diagonally), two vertical slits for the nose, and a smiley slit for the mouth. Each apple is placed on a small paper plate with the students name on it. The student uses his/her fingers to shape the face of the apple. They push in on the slits for the eyes, nose, and mouth. (not too hard) After a few days of drying the students push black-eyed peas in the eye socket area. The apple continues to dry around the pea. As the apples dry they turn in the most unusual faces. A week or so before Halloween we make witches out of them. I made a wire frame with wire coming up to push the apple face onto and wire arms. I cut Halloween fabric to fit over the wire. The students glue the fabric at the seams. It is attached at the shoulders, so the dress is put on before the head is stuck on.
I got some of those green plant stakes at a floral store. They came up through the dress and stuck into the apple. We glued spanish moss for hair. I made each witch a hat from paper bow material. They glued it on. They tied a belt of ribbon around the waist. The wire came down in an upside down v below the waist.
As a science lesson we weigh the apples right after they have been pealed. (record each student's apple weight on a weight watcher's or diet scale) Then weigh them again right before we turn them into witches. The students love to watch them change over the month. We discuss why the weight changed and where it went. They are a fun and different project.

We are currently doing an apple unit. We are going to celebrate Johnny Appleseed's birthday by tasting different apple recipes. We are also putting together an apple cookbook. I asked the parents to send in their child's favorite apple recipe. I then type the recipes and bind a book for each child. Also this Friday we are having an Apple Extravaganza. I have asked the P.E. teacher to dress up as Johnny Appleseed. He is going to read a story and talk to the kids about his adventures. We then have activity centers set up in 3 classrooms were the children can go and made apple projects. It's a lot of fun!

Here's an old-fashioned riddle story, which you could use to introduce an apple-related activity. You should have a knife and an apple ready, so at the end of the story you can act out the surprise. Here's my retelling of it:

The Little Red House

Once there were two children with nothing better to do. Noticing this, their grandmother said, "Find the little red house with no door and no windows, and a star inside, and you'll both have a sweet treat to eat"

The children were confused by what their grandmother had said, but since their grandmother knew so many things, they set out to look for the little red house.

The day was very hot, but the children walked around their entire neighborhood looking at all the houses. Finally they found a red house, but it was very large. Then they found a small red house, but it had a door and windows. In fact, all the houses had doors and windows.

Hot and tired, the children walked home. They wondered why their grandmother had played a trick on them.

"Did you find the little red house?" their grandmother asked. The two children shook their heads 'no' and looked very unhappy.

Seeing this, the grandmother said, "come with me" and walked out into the garden with her paring knife. "Here we are," she said reaching for a bright red apple.

She washed the apple and cut it in half with her paring knife. "One for you, and one for you," she said handing each child a piece.

Sure enough, there was the star just as their grandmother had promised.

1. I read the version by Steven Kellogg. Then I read the story by a different author. We compare/contrast the books. 2. We work on map skills by using all the places he went. Have students make Johnny's Journal, pretending to be him and writing about things he saw on his journey. 3. I bring in different kinds of apples and we have a tasting party. We also list the properties of each. We graph our favorite apples. 4. We discuss things made from apples and you might even taste and graph favorites. 5. Apple prints are fun(cutting the apple to expose the star shape).
6. Study apple trees.
Hope these help you out. Good Luck and Have Fun with it!

Take your class "apple picking" where they can look for paper apples around the class or building. Type facts or questions about apples. The children will get excited about looking for the apples and they'll learn on the way. Role play the story The Mouse and the Apple by Stephen Butler. Easy text and repetitive verse. I made the characters to use as a story retelling activity. You can use interactive writing to make character name cards for the children to wear for the role playing. We read Ten Apples Up On Top by Theo. LeSieg and made a class book. I took pictures of the children's faces and they glued a specified # of apples on top. The sentence on the bottom read __________ (name) has ______ (#) apples up on top. I also made a book myself with the students pictures called The Apples of Mrs. Chartier's Eye. I glued the pictures on an apple cut out on each page. I made a leaf for each apple with the name of each student. The children will match the names to the faces. (Leaves velcro on). After you make some pple treat, use interactive writing to write the recipe. My neighbor did hers with the sentence "I put in the ______." Then she'll turn it into a class book after the children illustrate it. For making groups in math I labeling paper trees with numbers. I have mini bingo dabbers for them to use to put that number of apples in the tree. You must already have the story about the Little Red House... We'll be doing our favorite apples graph, too. Good luck

I'm probably duplicating some of the ideas from the websites, but here are some of the things we do with apples. Most of them are math and science as those are my areas of responsibility.

Count apples (real ones) from one to twenty

Make patterns with red, yellow and green apples (again, real ones or paper cut-outs)

Make our own apple patterns on a xeroxed sheet of blank apples - 6 apples on each row, about 5 rows.

Learn the color words "red, yellow and green" (we color an apple page where each apple is printed with one of these words.)

Taste different kinds of apples and discuss the tastes.

Write about apples as a group and in our journals. We make a list of things we notice about apples, their color, their scent, their taste, etc.

Graph which kind of apple each student likes best: red, yellow or green.

Read books about apple trees and apple orchards.

Make applesauce from scratch.

Read the story of Johnny Appleseed.

Count the number of seeds in each apple we ate. Graph the results.

Make apple prints by cutting the apple either up and down in half or across in half. Across gives you a great star pattern. We use these works of art as part of our September calendar.

Plant an apple seed to see if it will grow. (They almost never do. They need to be chilled for several weeks before they'll sprout.)

Good luck with your unit. I love doing apples with first grade.

Hi--I just finished a mini-unit on apples.

Have you ever heard the story about the Little Red House? I told my kids a story about a little red house with no doors and no windows, but it had a chimney and a star inside. I framed it like there was a boy looking for something to do, and his mom challenged him to find the little red house with no doors.....I involve kids from my class in the story, and they're all looking, until they figure out it's an apple. A little red house with no doors and no windows with a chimney (the stem) and a star inside. Then we cut an apple crosswise (the opposite of how we usually cut apples ) and we see the seeds inside a star. Then we made apple prints.

We also talked about the sequence of how an apple grows and made a book. My kids keep showing me apples and where they flowers used to be on the bottom.

We also made a simple take home book. The pages said "Red apples" "Yellow apples" "Green apples" "Blue apples?" "Red apples, yum!"......all the way to "Blue apples? YUCK!" The kids colored the pages and took it home to read.

We also read "Ten Apples Up on Top" by Dr. Seuss/Theodore LeSieg. Then I had them draw a picture of their head and cut out and number ten apples to glue on their heads. Finally, we made applesauce! I had a parent volunteer, and we cut the apples using an apple slicer. Then we cooked them and stirred them all day. Then we ran them through a hand stirred mill and flavored it with cinammon and sugar. A big hit!

Good luck!Jennifer

*Read Ten Apples on Top by Leo Sieg. Practice balancing bean bags on top - who can balance ten? Create apple patterns using red/green/yellow apple prints on long strips of paper held vertically. Take a picture of each child's face with eyes looking up and attach to bottom of strip. It looks so cool!
*Hand out numbered paper apples, one for each child at line-up times. Have class line up in numerical order or reverse order. Great number sequence activity.
*Have kids each bring in an apple. Each child estimates how many seeds are in his apple. Use corer to cut apple appart. Use toothpicks to pick out seeds. Compare estimate to actual. Use seeds in an apple project. We make paper apple cores (large red circle cut in half with a wavy line , white paperwith ripped sides for core glued between circle halves, add stem, leaves and real seeds.)

We just finished our apple unit. Here is what we did:

Tasted green, yellow, red apples and graphed our favorites.
Planted apple seeds,
I cut brown "trunks" and wrote a number (1-20) on the trunk and they glued on the green top and stuck that many apple stickers to the tree,
They made apple mobiles
They painted paper plate apples
I made an apple file folder game to play with dice for number recognition
We read our own homemade apple books (shaped like apples, they counted, such as one apple, two apples, etc.) The kids used apple shaped rubber stamps to stamp that many apples on each page, then they learned to read them.

I hope that helps. I also incorporated apple stories and used apple worksheets to supplement the lessons. Good luck and have fun!!

I am with a kindergarten teacher who just finished an apple unit.

They graphed which apple was their favorite green or red.
cut an apple in half and dipped it in either red or green paint depending on which one they liked best then stamped the apple half on paper making it their head and drew their body.
in centers they:

weighed apples using a balance scale and counting bears.

did float and sink with differnt parts of the apple ex. skin, core, seed, stem, flesh

writing: teacher said "Apples are" and the student completed the sentence teacher helping the student sound out spelling.
at the end of the week they made bread and had apple butter with it.

this is all I can remeber but I hope it helps! Good luck
Renee

read an apple book called apples on my head and created a pattern with green and red apples on top of their head with cutouts and construction paper.

There is tons of literature, you can make applesauce, plant an apple seed, learn about apple trees, do apple math and write apple poems or they can write "My Life as an Apple" stories about their journey from a seed to an apple pie-- or where ever they want to end up. Aren't there also Johnny Appleseed songs or something? You could even get into that fable.

Math- You can have them sample the different types of apples, red, green, yellow. Graph their favorites using a bar graph.

Science- Explain where apples come from. (Seeds) Cut several apples and have the students observe and pick out the seeds. Have them find the core, the stem. Have them draw what they saw and label the parts.

If you want to integrate math and science into the unit here's an idea. Have each child bring in three apples red, yellow, and green. Count the total # of apples as a group or set up in a learning center. Weigh 1 apple, 2 apples. Sort the apples into groups. Make a graph showing how many of each color. Match apple words to pictures, i.e. core written on an index card and a picture card to match. Make applesauce and write the steps on a sequence chart using ordinal numbers. First we peeled the apples, second we cut the apples, etc. Make a diagram of an apple labeling the parts. Organize info into a data retrieval chart or web, i.e. parts, uses, varieties, etc.

science and apples:
how do apples grow? read a book about how apples grow from seeds, to trees to blossoms etc..
what food do you make from apples? apple sauce, apple juice. baked apples. change is science. cooking is science.
what happens to cut apples when they are left out in the open? why? what can happen to cut apples when orange juice is placed on them?

We just did a couple of fun activities with apples.

We gave each child a small apple to eat. They ate the apple and counted the seeds inside. Then we created a graph and graphed the numbers of seeds in each apple.

We took apples and cut them across and up and down. Then we put poster paint on sponges and made apple prints.

We also did a shared writing where we described how the apples tasted, looked, smelled and felt.

Hi, You can make a butterfly using an apple. Slice apple down lengthwise Keep skin on for color. Use celery strings for the antena, use a carrot stick for the center, use a long cracker for the branch and stick everthing together with some peanut butter. Then the kids get to eat their creation.

Hope you have fun!!!!

Can they be any subject? Not sure if this is what you are looking for, but here are a few things I have done:

You could do a lesson on using the scientific method to find out whats inside the apple. have the kids draw a picture of what they think the apple will look like if cut in half vertically and then horizontally. Then cut the apple to find out and then have kids draw a picture in a box next to their first showing what it actually looked like. Discuss whether or not hypotheses were correct.

Another easy one is a math lesson on sequencing by making applesauce. Write the directions on sentence strips and have the class put them in order. Discuss why it order is important. Then follow the recipe in the correct sequence to make your own applesauce.

Have the kids use their five senses as a tool for inquiry to compare different apples (green, red etc). Make a class chart comparing the different kinds (what did they look like, smell like, feel like, taste like) then graph which one was the class favorite.

Carve a pumpkin with the class for Halloween. The day before make 3 class graphs to determine what it will look like. Each student gets to vote once for eye shape, once for nose shape, then once for mouth shape. Asses students ability to read a graph by asking them to draw a picture of what our pumpkin will look like based on the graph (they have to be able to read which one had the most votes to draw the picture)

For a great cooking experience which goes beyond just making :s) applesauce :s) try this:

Have each kid bring in a sliced and cored apple. Dump all together in an electric frying pan or crock pot. Simmer a few hours or until soft. No need to add anything unless maybe some water if it gets dry--probably won't!

(I usually bring in a few apples myself to add to the mix. The mixture of all different types of apples is great for a good apple-y taste!)

In the bottom of a styrofoam cup (and without the kids seeing!) put about 6 mini marshmallows and 3 or 4 cinnamon red hots.

Spoon hot applesauce over the marshies and hotties. Let them sit for a bit to "work their magic" and to cool off.

Hand out the cups--no spoons yet! Ask kids to tap the cup lightly on the table a few times and see what happens.

(Here's what happens! The marshmallow melts and so do the red hots. As you tap the cup, the white and the red work their way up to the top of the cup as the applesauce is working it's way down with each tap. You'll see white with splotches of red! Roses in the snow!)

Hand out the spoons and let them eat. The marshies add the sweet and the red hots add the spice! Perfect-o!

It's very fun--fun to do in the winter time too after a romp in the snow during recess. You could extend your observations about apples...they are picked in the fall and last all winter! You can't always get watermelon and berries and peaches in the winter but you can get apples! :s)