A sure sign of fall, apples are a quintessential part of the autumn season. Kids love learning about these brightly colored fruit. Explore apples with your kids with these fun apple activities!
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The weather is changing and the leaves are beginning to turn. Apple season is many people's favorite time of year. Exploring apples with your kids is a wonderful way to celebrate this season together.
List of Activities
- Apple Picking
- Dissect an Apple
- Math Lessons
- Sorting Activities
- Germinate Apple Seeds
- Easy Yarn Art
- A is for Apple
- Apple Books
- Cooking and Baking
- Apple Science Experiment
- More Fall Activities
For more fruit related post, make sure to check out these blueberry activities for kids!
Age Range
Kids of all ages can benefit from these activities. The great thing about these lessons is you can easily modify them to fit the needs of your kids. This post will focus on the following age groups:
- Toddlers
- Preschoolers
- Kindergartners
- Elementary
- Middle School
Topics to Explore
| Anatomy of an Apple | Parts of a Plant |
| Life Cycle of an Apple Tree | Pollination |
Skills to Practice
| Making Observations | Asking Questions |
| Following Directions | Making Art |
| Fine Motor Skills | Hand-Eye Coordination |
| Reading Measurements | Following Directions |
Apple Picking with Kids
Kids of all ages love to go apple picking. Whether you grow apples in your own yard or have a favorite local orchard, apple picking is a kid favorite. I love checking out several local apple orchards throughout the season.
Apple picking allows kids to not only pick fresh fruit, but see where their food comes from. What better way to learn about food than to head out into the field and see growing on an apple tree themselves!
Fun fact, different varieties of apples ripen at different times. Going to a u-pick apple farm exposes kids to different varieties that you may not find at the grocery store.
Another benefit to all of the different varieties is the ability for little kids to see the ripening process. Apples don't just magically appear and are ready to be picked.
After a flower is pollinated, it takes weeks for a fruit to fully form and ripen. Seeing this up close first hand is great way for visual learners to understand how fruit forms.
Even better, head over to the orchard during peach picking, which happens right before apple picking season. That way kids can see trees filled with mostly unripe apples.
Apple tree coloring pages are a great follow up activity for young children after apple picking.
Apple Dissection and Anatomy of an Apple
A fun way to learn about apples is to perform an apple dissection. Preschoolers, kindergartners, and elementary aged kids would enjoy this activity.
All you need is an apple along with a knife or apple corer. Magnifying glasses or a field microscope are also great tools for your kids to use. Don't underestimate the joy kids experience when looking at everyday items under a magnifying lens!
Enjoy an apple treat while you learn about the parts of an apple. Kids can observe the thin skin of an apple, flesh, core, and seeds. Stems if still attached can be observed along with the calyx.
Apple Math Activities
A great way to integrate some math into an apple dissection is to count the number of seeds. If your kids cut open more than one apple, they can compare the amount of seeds found in each. Older children can then go on an calculate the average!
Even without cutting open an apple, kids can measure the diameter of different apples. The weight of the apples can also be calculated using a kitchen scale.
If you homeschool your kids, there are endless ways to integrate apples into math and science lessons. Children love it when learning blends in with day to day events.
Apple Sorting Activities
If you have toddlers or preschoolers, they can line up the apples according to size. They can even compare two apples and discuss which one is big and which is small.
Young children love sorting activities and everyday items make great manipulatives for practicing classification.
To modify this for older children, simply have them sort by a specific characteristic such the diameter. Then let them use a fabric measuring tape to collect some data. Bonus points if they then create a graph to show their results!
Germinate a Few Apple Seeds
Try to germinate a few seeds from an apple you cut up. Don't be surprised if your little one is eager to plant the apple seeds to try to grow a new apple tree once they learn about the life cycle of an apple.
You can try to germinate the seeds by placing them in between two pieces of damp paper towels. To keep the environment moist, store the paper towels inside of a plastic baggie or container.
Check on them daily and change out the paper towel to avoid molding. Even if nothing sprouts or you discard them after they sprout, kids will see the connection between seed, plant, and fruit. Many times learning science is all about the experience and less about the final product.
Make Simple Apple Art
Kids of all ages enjoy easy art projects. If you are looking for a hands-on craft that involves different textures, apple yarn art is fun to create.
Simply cut up different lengths of red yarn. Then let you kids add glue to the cardstock in the shape of an apple. Add the pieces of yarn to the paper. To create a filled in apple, simply add more glue and stick down more yarn until you are happy with the end result.
To make the stem, simply draw one on the apple using brown marker. Leaves can even be brought in from outside and glued down around the apple's stem.
A fun apple craft for preschoolers, but I can see older kids really getting into this and making beautiful geometric patterns using yarn!
Children love expressing themselves through art. Sometimes, its the simplest activities that they enjoy the most!
Apple stamping is another fun art activity that involves using apples to apply paint to paper. A really easy activity for kids of all ages.
A is for Apple Activity
Preschoolers, kindergartners, and early elementary aged kids love practicing letter sense. For this activity, you can simply write a large letter A on a piece of blank paper. I love these mini art pads and these markers. Then write the word apple below.
Kids can practice tracing the different letters with their fingers. If you have access to fresh apples, give your child the seeds to use as manipulatives.
I thought it would be fun to place them on the letter A. My toddler however, had his own ideas! He liked placing them below each letter of the word apple. I quickly snapped this photo before he moved them all! I love seeing what kids come up with when they have the freedom to create.
Young children can even use your letters as a guide to practice writing their own on a separate sheet of paper. Super simple, but a really fun way for kids to practice their letters.
Read a Few Books about Apples
What is great about books is you can read them with children of different ages. If you homeschool, books are a great way for kids to learn about new topics and concepts. I broke down the books below by age.
Toddlers and Preschoolers
My favorite toddler book about apples is Jill McDonald's How do Apples Grow? The perfect board book style book for preschoolers. Its hard to find board books that are filled with scientific information, but this book does just that.
My toddler loves reading through the pages with me while talking about the different stages of the apple tree. Concepts including how apples grow from flowers, the structure of a flower, and how bees pollinate apple trees.
The book concludes with foods made using apples. There really is nothing to dislike about this book, I highly recommend it.
Elementary
Another great pick is Beth Charles book, How to Grow an Apple Pie. This cute picture book follows the growth of an apple tree from planting until the first harvest. Katie Rewse's illustrations are bright and cheerful.
Kids can relate the book's main character, a six year old little girl who is waiting patiently for her apple tree to produce fruit. At the end of the picture book, there is recipe for how to make your own apple pie.
Upper Elementary
If you homeschool and have children of multiple ages, older can also learn from books. The Gravity Tree, The True Story of a Tree that Inspired the World is a great pick for upper elementary and middle school aged kids. Learn about Isaac Newton's discovery of gravity in this picture book.
Your kids will then learn about Albert Einstein and even Stephen Hawking's discoveries. If you child is into science, they will enjoy this picture book.
It is great when you are able to do a unit study with kids of varying ages just by adjusting a few of the resources.
Apple Book for All Ages
The Giving Tree is another classic which I think is a valuable read for toddlers all the way up to adults. Seriously, I can't help but cry every time I read this book! Shel Silverstein does not disappoint. Many great discussions can stem from reading this one book together.
Make an Apple Dessert Together
What better way to learn about apples, than to make a tasty apple treat with your kids. Perfect for kids of all ages, toddlers through upper elementary. Keep is simple and top apple slices with peanut butter. Or make homemade apple sauce together by cooking apples on the stove.
If you are feeling ambitious, bake an apple pie. For something new, try out this homemade fruit leather. Whatever you decide to make, kids love being involved when baking and cooking. It is a great way to pass on family recipes or create a new family tradition!
Learn Skills in a Hands-On Way
- Mixing
- Measuring
- Melting Point
- Reading directions
- Fractions while cutting
- Liquid vs Dry Ingredients
- Teaspoons vs Tablespoons
- Setting and Reading a Timer
Conduct an Apple Science Experiment
Save a few apple slices while making an apple dessert together to use for this apple oxidation experiment. Kids will test out different liquids to see how well they stop an apple from turning brown.
The best part about this activity is it can be as formal or informal as you would like. Believe it or not, kids as young as toddlers will enjoy this activity all the way up to middle school aged kids!
More Autumn Activities for Kids
Hopefully this list gave you some ideas and inspiration for apple activities that you can do with your kids. Fall is a wonderful time to learn about the changing season with your kids. For more ways to learn about autumn with your kids check out the posts below.
- Free Fall Bucket List Printable from Nicolette at Gathering Grace Home
Let us know in the comments, how do you enjoy apple season with your kids?
Teresa says
Great information and loved the activities you showed! Also, great job with your photography! 🙂
Kelsey says
So many great ideas here! I’ll have to give some of these a try with my littles!
Dee says
Another amazing post Julie! Thank you for sharing your expertise!
Julie says
Thank you Dee!