Homeschool Theme: Apples!

September was apple month, and I started it off by leaving this little treat and note on each child's desk the first school day in September.   It is a tradition I hope to keep up - welcoming each month with a little something for the kids in the school room.  :)

In addition to those below, I had some other activities I wanted to take pictures of.  However, it quickly became apparent that if I waited too much longer, it might be November before the post was up.  Thus, I decided to just make do with the pictures I have.

Bobbing for apples!  I would call out a sight word and my youngest would find the word and "bob" for that apple.  He did not use his teeth but scooped the apples out with a utensil.  However, if you are feeling ambitious, your kids could use their teeth.

My eldest also wanted a turn so I adapted the activity to one of her subjects.  I would call out an English word, and she had to "bob" for the apple with the matching Latin translation.

Additional possibilities for this game could be bobbing for apples containing certain letters, matching sounds, numbers, math facts, vocabulary (just call out a definition and the child finds the matching word apple), etc.  BTW - the apples are simply circles cut out of red craft foam.

I honestly can't remember where I found this handy green apple "thing" (ice cube tray?) - maybe Target last year?  I wrote numbers inside with a wet erase marker and my son had to place the correct number of "seeds" inside each apple (we used beans because I did not have apple seeds ready).

I saw this activity on a website years and years ago and thought it was cute.  I made it for my daughter when she was young and now my little man gets to enjoy it as well!  The green pipe cleaners are little worms that he had to match up with the holes on each apple.

We also practiced sorting good and bad apples.  My daughter would look under each "apple" for a spelling word.  Some words I spelled correctly and some incorrectly.  It was her job to sort each into  the appropriate pile based on the spelling of the word.

This was another sorting activity for pronouns (subject, possessive, object of).  My daughter would push the word worms through the correct apple hole.

Apple bingo is a great homeschool activity because children of different skill levels can all participate together.  For our family, I would call out a number and my youngest would find that number on his tree (covering it with a pom pom "apple"), while my eldest and her friend would find the math fact which matched the "answer" I called out and cover it on their trees.

We also used one of the same trees to practice making our sight word for the week!

Even if you don't live near an orchard, you can still pick apples!  I used a green vinyl tablecloth for the top of the tree (they run about $1 or $1.50 in the Walmart party section).  The trunk was made from wrinkled up packing paper and the apples were cheap red paper plates (I think they were about $1 as well - found in the Walmart party section).

This is another excellent activity for more than one age/skill level.   We used it for more math fact practice.  I would call out an "answer" (ex. 6), and my daughter and her friend would pick the apple with the matching math fact (ex. 4+2).  My youngest would find and pick that number (6) from his tree.

Who knew caramel apple cups could be educational?  These were a take-home treat the day we had homeschool friends over to celebrate an "apple" theme with activities, games, a craft, etc.  The kids each received one so they could make their own caramel apple at home while learning about liquids and solids, the different processes of changing one form to another (melting, cooling), etc.

Additional activities which I don't have pictures for:

- An artist study of some of Cezanne's paintings of apples (followed by an activity where the kids were given the opportunity to draw their own picture)

- An adorable 3-D apple (life cycle) book my friend purchased on TPT

- apple tasting (unusual kinds) and graphing