Apple Math

This was a fun activity that I saw on pinterest once again! It was so simple and I had everything in the house. I cut a tree shape out of construction paper (I figure we can use it for a bunch of learning activities this fall, and maybe again in the spring!). I found a small bag of small red pompoms (the apples), and 2 dice. I had the kids roll both dice, they then had to add the dots, and place that many apples on the tree. They counted out loud while they put the apples on the tree. They both really had fun with this, and kept asking to do it again. I like that we had 2 dice because it made them add up to 12! This was originally posted on Getting Messy with Ms. Jessi!

Fall craft day 2011

We had our annual first day of fall craft in the park this last Friday. Happy Fall everyone! This year we did apple prints, leaf prints, and paper plate apple cores. I think all the kids had a great time. Ages ranged from 7-2 years of age, and they were all able to do all the crafts with just a little help.

I cut the apples in half both ways to give the kids some variety. The older ones got some really nice prints, the little ones just liked smearing the paint around the paper with the apple. But it was all about doing something new, right?

 I saw these on pinterest a while back, and new the kids would get a kick out of these. They are just one paper plate, with the leaves cut out of the side. I had the kids color them with markers, and we used glue dots to attach the leaves. Even the littlest ones enjoyed this!

 Our finished apple prints, L is on top, and D is on bottom.

 Our leaf prints, Mine is on top, and L's is on the bottom. This one did not turn out how I had thought, but was still fun. D and I went for a walk and collected a large bag of different kinds of leaves, flowers, and grasses to use. We found so many neat ones, I saved all the ones that did not get paint on them to do leaf rubbings later this week.

The books we read:
Fall Leaf project by Margaret McNamara
A is for Autumn by Robert Maass
Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf by Lois Ehlert

Past fall craft days:
apple tree
fall craft time 2010

Pinterest Part 2

I know, this post has TONS of pictures. Sorry about that, but D and I have been having lots of fun, and I wanted to share it all with you guys.  As I have said before, pinterest.com has been helping me come up with even more fantastic ideas to do with the kids, and here are two more that we tried! Follow me on pinterest here: http://pinterest.com/kellyheet/

First up was drawing on a white piece of paper with a white crayon, and then going over the pictures with bingo stampers. D got a fun metallic set for her birthday and was very happy to pull them out again. I started by drawing 2 pictures for each of us. She had so much fun doing those, that she asked if she could draw her own. She drew 3 more, but my favorite was the "ballerina".
As seen on Let's Explore!

D's self drawn ballerina

Next up was making our own apple pie play dough. We started with the recipe from Counting Coconuts, and then took the advice from  Little Wonders' Days! In the play dough, we added Cinnamon, Nutmeg, and Allspice. I think next time we will add a little vanilla extract, or an apple candy oil for a better scent in addition to the spices. As you can see, D had fun mixing up her own play dough!

It was a fun pie color, but D insisted on coloring it red when we were all done. The color of apples, and her favorite color!

Then I made us some "mats" to play with. I drew an Uppercase and Lowercase A, and wrote the word apple on a sheet of computer paper. I stuck these inside the plastic page protectors. I also wrote out squares with numbers on them, and got out some fall cookie cutters. D pulled out her rolling pin and knife to help out.

First game we played was hide the "apple seeds", this was taken directly from Little wonders'! Loved it! These are just some wooden beads I have had laying around since my "hemp necklace making days". I hide a handful of them in the play dough, pulled the number card out, and told her to find them.

She thought this was great fun, and even wanted to hide them for mommy to find.

Our fall cookie cutters! A turkey, 2 leaves, and an acorn. I think I need some more fall ones.

 And lastly I had D roll out snakes and shape them into the letters. I have seen this all over the homeschool blogs for a long time now, but this was our first time doing this. What a fun and easy way to learn letter shapes. She had a good time doing it, and it encouraged her to play more with the play dough in ways she has not done before.

Johnny Appleseed day!

We celebrated Johnny Appleseed yesterday.  Most people celebrate him in the fall when apples are all around.  Not us crazy kids!  We actually do it on his death, or supposedly!  Morbid, yes, but we don't tell the kids that.  We ask that everyone just bring an apple snack.  There were sliced apples, applesauce cups, oatmeal applesauce cookies, apple butter with mini bagels, apple jacks cereal, apple juice!  Last year Adam made apple seed bean bags for the kids to play with.  We had to remake the dirt piles the kids throw the seeds in.  L and D cut green stripes of construction paper to make grass for them.  I also had the kids make apple trees out of construction paper.  Luckily I had found a small apple shaped punch this fall in the dollar section at Target.  All the kids (between the ages of 1-4) did a great job of glueing the pieces together.

The books we read were:
Johnny Appleseed: My story by David L. Harrison
Our Apple Tree by Gorel Kristina Naslund
Ten Apples up on Top! by Dr. Suess

All 3 of our trees.

D's tree. She was very proud of the apples falling off the tree, and the on that is going to land on the top. Not sure where it is coming from, but oh well!

Apple seed toss game.