Apple Season

Fall is my favorite season. I love all of the themes that go along with fall. Teaching about apples and Johnny Appleseed is always a highlight. This year was no different.

This year I worked on adjectives with my students. Each student had to say one adjective even if it was the same as another student's word. This helped my English language learners participate in the activity. After we put out apples on our tree, we wrote apple 5 sense poems.

We read many books on Johnny Appleseed and learned so much. By the time we were done, the students were able to write an entire paragraph about him. I kept it a traditional expository paragraph with a introduction sentence, three details, and a conclusion sentence.

We are currently working on opinion writing. I had the students taste three types of apples. They then voted and wrote a small opinion piece about their favorite apple.

Apple tie die art is so easy.

Step 1: Have students color with market on a coffee filter
Step 2: Spray coffee filter with water using a spray bottle
Step 3: Let the coffee filter sit and dry

The marker will bleed together. After this, I used an apple template to make the frame. I taught the students how to cut out the middle by folding the apple in half and cutting out the inside. They make the perfect window design!

There is so much that can be done with apples. I also held apple stations where the students measured, weighed, floated, and cut apples in different ways. It met some math and science standards. After the students were done, we cut up all the apples and made apple sauce using the crockpot! Mmmm Delicious!

Earth Day

Earth Day started last week, in my classroom, with a series of activities to get my students thinking about what they could do to impact the Earth in a positive way. We started by reading our story of the week, which happen to be about Johnny Appleseed, a true conservationist who loved wildlife.  He planted apple trees for people moving west, creating a sustainable food source across the United States. Our story told of a normal man doing an extraordinary thing. He was a superhero to settlers. And it called students to think about what extraordinary thing they could do to help the Earth. My students came up with an amazing list of small but purposeful activities that they could realistically preform on a day to day basis. I took an idea from Cara over at The First Grade Parade and created this thought provoking poster with my students. It took a whole morning to get each green and blue hand print done. I had the students work on writing. At the moment, I am teaching how to do a research based All About book. The students are really into it, so it was easy to have them work on that while I called individual students. I then typed up all of the ideas that they came up with, and we placed them around the outside. Currently this poster is up in my classroom. I think that it is so beautiful that it might stay up until Open House.