One of my favorite books for teaching about Johnny Appleseed is the one to the left. It has an excellent poem about him and the pioneers. It also gives a true account of his life at the end. Read this to your children. At the end you can use it for discussion on many different topics. 1) Discuss poetry. I love this site Scholastic Poetry game my kids had a great time playing with the poetry engine. You can then have your student write a haiku (three lines, first and third lines are 5 syllables, second line is 7 syllables), a limerick, or free verse about apples. 2) If you are learning about the westward movement you can use the poem to discuss the lives of pioneers. 3) Use it to discuss how plants grow from seeds.
Another great book for learning about apples is called How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World (Dragonfly Books)
. This is a fun book about where all of the ingredients used in apple pie come from. It takes you on a trip around the world and helps show kids how we use things from all over the world, everyday. It also has an easy apple pie recipe that you can do with your kids at the end!One of my favorite activities to do with kids is to cut an apple in half, dip it in a light paint and stamp it on paper. You then label the different parts of an apple on the paper. Glue the seeds to the middle where they go. This is a great activity to help children understand more about plants. You can use this as a math lesson as well by having your child(ren) guess how many seeds are in the apple and then count up how many seeds are actually inside. Great for estimation! If you cut the apple in half width wise you can do all of this and add in this wonderful story The Star in the Apple. It is a wonderful visual for God's plan in all of our lives.
I also found this terrific website for fun apple lesson plans and activities. The Virtual Vine. I was thoroughly impressed by the amount of information and activities they had contained there.
Have fun with this season! Enjoy those apples!
