9 Apple Themed Activities for Kindergarten

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There are so many creative kindergarten teachers and bloggers who share their ideas and I love them all for being so generous with their creativity and knowledge! September is all about apples to me. The weather is starting to get cool and we are all in the mood for apple pies and soups and pumpkin lattes. I love me a good theme, so what better than Apples for September? I mostly used pinterest and teacherspayteachers.com for ideas and printables to supplement our curriculum. These were some of our favorite activities over the last 2 weeks that incorporated apples:

Apple Handprint Craft

I got this idea from Jennifer of Ramblings of a Crazy Woman. She had her kids make the stem with a painted green hand. We just traced our hands on construction paper to be a little less messy. This was a great craft for both kids because Uggie could tear the pieces of paper and Leelee could cut her strips with scissors.

Painting with Apples

Picture from Playsational.com

I laid down a cheap disposable table cloth and let the kids explore painting with the pieces of an apple. My two year kept trying to eat the apples, paint and all. But both kids really enjoyed the experience.

Painting with Apples Tutorial

Stained Glass Apples

I've seen this idea on several different sites. Since I have a new laminator (that is so addicting and fun!) I used this tutorial for the most part.

Stained Glass Apple Art Tutorial

Apple Pie Scented Play Dough

This playdough recipe from It's Gravy Baby is super easy and took 10min to make.

We rolled some balls in different sizes and compared the sizes and also put the balls in order from small to large and large to small.

We also made the letter A.

I love activities that can be simple enough for a toddler, yet still incorporate kindergarten level skills for my daughter.

Apple Pie Scented Playdough Recipe

Homemade Crockpot Apple Sauce

We are reading about healthy eating and cooking in our language arts curriculum, so this was perfect! We utilized some new vocabulary words and put them into action. (Ingredient, recipe, nutrition, natural were some of our vocab words). The recipe is so simple and can be found at Skinny Taste.

Homemade Crockpot Apple Sauce Recipe

The Parts of An Apple
I put this together with one of the graphics I purchased from mygrafico. I laminated the pieces and cut them out and we put together and identified the different part of an apple and also talked about the stages of an apple.

You can download this Parts of an Apple printable for free here

Parts of an Apple Download

Apple Sensory Learning
In science we are learning about our different senses, so I made up a little worksheet to compliment what we are learning.

Download Apple Observation Worksheet

A is for Apple Tot and Preschool Pack

This printable had things I was able to use for kindergarten and toddler related activities.

A is for Apple Tot and Preschool Pack

Apple Picking

No apple unit is complete without a field trip the an apple picking field! If there aren't any fields where you live I think a farmer's market would be the next best option.

So ready for October and to move on to pumpkins. Kind of appled out :)

Haben Sie ein schönes Wochenende (Have a great weekend!)

xoxo
Frau Wright

Our First Day of Homeschool Kindergarten

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Yesterday was our first day of homeschool kindergarten and it went better than expected. I was surprised at how serious we handled the day. It was of course fun, but it's like we both went into different modes. It was more of a teacher/student relationship then a mom/daughter relationship. I was so much more patient with Leelee than I normally am; kind of how a teacher is with a student. And she was far more receptive than she is when she is in daughter mode, lol.

Throughout the day I really had mixed emotions. I had a romanticized idea of traditional kindergarten in my head. The whole... first day of school outfit and the experience of meeting new little friends and recess and all the fun things that happen in kindergarten. I loved kindergarten and elementary school and part of me was wondering if I was doing the right thing. Was I robbing her of these childhood memories?

But then there were moments during the day I felt so happy we were doing homeschool. For one, 9am is a much easier start time for our family than 8:15 am. We are 100% fully ready to by 9am. I love that part. Second, we made cookies for our snack. I thought that was something really special.

Today was our second day and I didn't feel as unsure of myself and our decision to homeschool. After talking to my sweet neighbor she reminded me that things like this don't have to be forever. If we ever want to put her in a traditional school we can. My husband reminded me that we will create our OWN traditions that Leelee will be fond of and always remember. So those comments coupled with the experience of today made me feel a lot better.

Another thing that surprised me was the importance of an actual classroom. I have read many blogs and talked to other homeschool parents who didn't use the space of a homeschool room. For them school is done on the couch or at the dining room table. I was really close to setting up our homeschool day in such a way that we would do our lessons at the dining table. But for us, an actual homeschool room really sets the precedence. It's an atmosphere that as soon as we walk in we know the purpose of the room and the roles we need to have. For our family right now, the room is a big part of our success. Leelee talks about how much she loves her classroom and the last two days as soon as we walked in the room she has been in student mode. That might change as we get older, but that's the beauty of it all. We can be flexible and next year we may be doing school work in the living room. (btw, I hope any friends that read this know I am NOT comparing or even knocking traditional school. I think there are excellent teachers, schools and curriculums. We have our own reasons for why homeschool is right for us at this point in life. But it's definitely not something I feel is better. It's just better for US right now and that's all :)

Although I did set up a classroom for us, it's nowhere near as fancy as some of the rooms I've seen on pinterest and the blogosphere. I tried to not overwhelm myself and just K.I.S.S with the homeschool room since this is our first year.

I bought the monthly calendar from amazon. The rug, little table and chairs are from IKEA. The banner and alphabet letters on the wall I made and printed myself.

If you like these wall letters, you can print them here for free. Just please be kind and do not alter the images and just link back here if you do share the image on your site.

With SO much going on it's essential for me to write EVERY single thing down. I have a lot less stress knowing that dinner and grocery lists are planned and appointments are scheduled right in.

I printed the "week of" printables here.

The calendars can be downloaded and printed here.

I really love this message and wanted something inspirational for myself as well as Leelee in the classroom.

I bought these cardboard storage boxes for IKEA. They were 5.99 euro for two boxes. I printed up these labels so the entire family knows where to put things back and also where to find needed supplies.

I also saw this idea on pinterest for helping to teach time. We haven't gotten to that yet, but I thought the idea was so awesome.

Day two and I don't feel so nuts for taking on such a huge responsibility. I can do this. Sure there will be days we are in pajamas all day. And there will be days I want to pull my hair out. But I think this is going to be worth it all.

Till my next blog post....Tschüs!


xoxo
Frau Wright