All About Apples

The beginning of fall means that apple season is here! I am excited to take baby girl apple picking and then play, taste and cook with all of the apples. Read on for all of the ways I promoted language development with all things apple.

Visit an Apple Orchard:

A trip to the apple orchard provides opportunities for language development in a natural setting. Below I have listed 5 simple ways to promote language development while picking apples.

Reach Up: Use the spatial direction, up, to talk about the location of the apples in the tree. Give the verbal direction, reach up, to direct your child where to pick the apple.

Put In: After picking the apple, use the routine, familiar direction of put in to direct your child to place the apple in the container.

Big/Little: Find big apples and little apples. Use big/little to compare and contrast the different sizes of apples.

Colors: Find red, green and yellow apples. Label the different colors.

Taste: Taste the apples. Use descriptive words (crunchy/juicy/sweet) to describe what your child is tasting.

Make an Apple Sensory Bin:

Fill a bin with dried oatmeal, a sprinkle of cinnamon and a dash of nutmeg. Place miniature apples, tin cups and a wooden spoon in the container. Show your child how to mix the ingredients with the spoon, scoop the oats with the tin and then pour the oats out.

Make Apple Chips:

Not only is exposing your child to cooking a great way to expand her palate, but the process provides a great way for her to build her language skills. Check out this post for simple ways to build you’d child’s language while cooking.

First, we used the apple corer and slicer to prep the apples. We then followed this recipe to make the yummy chips.