Studying the 5 Senses With Apples!

1-2-3 Come Do Some Fruity Fun With The 5 Senses Activities With Me

Apples are a big deal here in Michigan, so it's one of my first fall themes. As part of our science standards, students need to learn about the 5 senses as well, so I thought it would be fun to teach the 5 senses using an apple theme.

I had so much fun designing these activities, that I made 3 different packets for you to choose from, and am featuring them on the blog today.

First up is the 5 Senses With An Apple Head packet. Completed projects turn out absolutely adorable; and are rather hilarious, so if your kiddos are like mine, you'll hear: "Can I please make another one?!"

Suspended from the ceiling, or use as a border for the top of a hallway wall. I’ve included a “Fun With The Five Senses” apple head poster for your display.

There's a huge assortment of facial feature options. Simply pick a few of your favorites.

Children select a nose, mouth, and some ears & eyes, then glue them to their apple head. (There’s also a pattern for a stem and leaf).

Besides the facial features, I’ve also included patterns for a hair bow/bow tie, glasses, a mask, and a selection of mustaches.

I give the option of adding dangling legs with cute sneakers. (Accordion-folding paper, is a great fine motor skill, which will help strengthen finger muscles.)

To reinforce the 5 senses, there’s a set of labels students cut and glue to their apple head as well; or they can simply label their creation.

Besides the craftivity, laminate a set of apples, along with 3 or 4 facial feature options, plus a set of labels, to be used as a “design an apple head” independent center activity.

Allow children to take a photo of their completed creation, then make small thumbnails of each child’s apple head and put them in a class-made, picture booklet. I’ve provided a cover and album page for this as well.

Because there’s such a huge variety of facial feature options, laminate some and have little ones sort them according to which sense they go with. I’ve included a colorful sorting mat for this.

Children can also use the pieces to create patterns: AB-AB, ABC-ABC etc.

For more practice, there's a BW worksheet, where children cut & glue the facial feature to one of the matching 5 senses, which makes a quick assessment tool.

One of the nice things about these activities, is that even if you don't have time to plug them into your apple unit, they easily fit in during October and November with a harvest theme as well.

Next up is an Itty Bitty Booklet: "The 5 Senses With An Apple." There are 4 pages, on a one-page template, for an easy-peasy, "print & go" activity.

I started out with a simple little apple graphic, but then started diddling around with the idea of making the apple look sort of like a “Mr. Potato Head”.

The result made me laugh. I thought your students would find this silliness fun too; thus there are 2 options for the booklet.

For one use the realistic apple or go a bit wild and crazy with the "apple head" option. You could also give your kiddos a choice.

I’ve included a full color sample of both booklets, so that you can easily make an example to share with your students, to help explain what you want them to do.

Remind them, to not only complete the sentence by thinking up an adjective, but remember to add the end punctuation as well. (Woo hoo for extra teachable moments!)

For more reinforcement, I’ve included a set of Memory Match cards, which you can also use to play the whole-group game “I Have; Who Has?”

There’s also a set of “label me” worksheets, which come in full-color, for you to use as a sample to help explain what you want children to do, then later, hang up for a poster that students can refer to.

There are 2 options for the BW student worksheet. For one, students cut and glue the labels to the matching section of their apple head. For the other worksheet they write in the words.

If you’d like to whole-group assess the 5 senses, have students do the cut and glue one first, then later, as an assessment tool, use the worksheet where they write in the words.

To heighten the experience of using all 5 senses, give each student an apple, or at least a slice of one. They examine it as they complete each page.

Finally, I thought maybe there are some teachers out there who'd like more of a variety than just apples, thus the Fruity-Faced Friend Five Senses packet was born, which is my personal favorite.

Designing one is really quite addicting, so be prepared when your kiddos ask to make another one!

Besides apples, there are 15 black & white fruit head options, plus a huge assortment of fruit-themed facial features to depict the 5 senses.

Completed projects look adorable suspended from the ceiling, or used as a border for the top of a hallway wall. There are 9 posters for your display.

Children look over the options, then snip one from the pattern page.
This way, all you have to do is run off the templates, while children get practice cutting, coloring and gluing together a 5-senses “fruity-faced friend”.

I’ve included “gloved hands” (like Mickey Mouse) for the “touch/feel” sense, but children could also trace one of their hands on a sheet of folded paper, then cut once to make two hands, which they glue (thumbs up) to the sides of their fruit head.

To reinforce the 5 senses, there’s a set of labels students cut and glue to their fruity face as well; or you can simply have them label each sense with a marker.

Besides the craftivity, there are templates for a “Design A Fruity-Faced Friend” independent center.

Choose from 20, colorful fruit head posters, along with 5 sheets of facial feature-fruit options, and colorful hands.

Children arrange the various fruits ’til they come up with a “fruity-faced friend” that they really like. (This activity is also quite addicting, as it’s so much fun mixing & matching to create hilarious fruity little friends!)

Even if children use the same "feature" cards, just by tweaking how you "arrange" them, changes the character entirely. I diddled around to create 6 different fruity-faced friends, then took a photograph to show you what I mean.

Allow students to take a photo of their completed creation, then make small thumbnails of each child’s fruity friend and put them in a class-made, photo album.

I’ve provided a cover and album page for this. Students color the picture, write their name in the blank, as well as the name of their “fruity friend”.

Laminate the pages, collate & put in your center. Keep your collection of photo albums (as you collect them each year) in a basket in this center to give students ideas.

For another center activity, there’s a set of “label me” fruity-faced friend posters. Children place the word labels for the five senses, on the posters.

For further reinforcement, I’ve also included 5 worksheets. Do a “cut & glue” version first, then later, to whole-group assess, do one of the “fill-in-the-blank” worksheets.

As always, there's a FREEBIE in each blog. Today's featured FREEBIE is an apple math mat game.

This apple "craftivity" is a super-fun way to reinforce addition and/or subtraction. If you teach older students, I've also included a template to make a multiplication apple game.

Well that's it for today. Thanks for stopping by. Our son is getting married this Saturday so my feet have hit the floor running this morning.