Preschool 5 Senses Apple Activity and Free Printable Class Book

Read below about an apple activity that’s sure to engage your preschoolers’ 5 senses. It’s a great addition to your list of simple sensory activities for preschool. Bonus, there’s a free printable at the bottom of the post, so be sure to grab that too.

Related: 50+ Apple Ideas for Kids

Apple tasting is a must for a preschool apple theme (in my opinion)! You can take it a step further by exploring the apples with all 5 senses. Lots of fun and playful learning, especially when the findings are turned into a class book.

I know this apple activity isn’t a super original idea! I still like to do it every year for multiple reasons:

• It’s another real way to engage the children in learning. They’re able to use all of their senses during this activity.
• It’s fun, and the kiddos love it!
• There’s tons of language development throughout this activity. I love to hear how the children describe the apples, and they learn new ways to discuss what they’re sensing.
• Science and math are interwoven with literacy! We used our senses, we observed, we discussed, we sorted, we graphed, we compared data, and we wrote about our findings.

5 Senses Apple Activity

To start things off, we had a quick chat about our five senses – sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell. We also touched base on what we use to explore these senses (eyes, ears, tongues, skin, and noses).

Sight, Sound, Touch, and Smell

From there, I had the children take a peek at the apples we had assembled. (I find it best to ask parents to send it a specific color apple to ensure we get an even distribution). I asked the children to tell me what they observed just by looking at the apples.

After this, the children asked about the sense of sound. So I asked if they thought they would hear anything from the apples. When we shook them, no sound was heard. One of the kids commented, “I bet it would make a noise if I dropped it!” That was a great point, but we didn’t end up dropping any on the ground at that point. I explained we’d be exploring more with sound in a bit.

The sense of smell was what the children focused on next. They took turns taking a quick sniff of the apples. I explained they’d be able to smell the apples even more once we were getting them ready to eat.

Next up was the sense of touch. This conversation was held as we got the apples ready for a wash. So the children were able to touch the apples they brought as we took them to be cleaned. Of course, we touched on sound again as the apples did make a noise when dropped into a bowl of water.

Materials for the 5 Senses Activity

This set of activities is so much fun! And you only need a few items for both the apple five senses book and the apple taste testing activity. Here’s what we used and some other options as well (I may get commissions for purchases made through links in this post):

• “We like Apples” printable book (Get your copy at the bottom of this post!)
• Crayons
• Markers
• Colored pencils
• Dot markers
• Stapler
• Staples
• A variety of apples
• Apple peeler, slicer, and corer

Of course, these are just a few options. You can choose materials based on what you have and what will work best for your classroom!

Taste Testing Apple Activity 

The final sense we touched on was, of course, the sense of taste. A fellow teacher brought in this cool contraption so we could peel, core, and slice the apples all at once!

Related: Counting Apples Emergent Reader

I had a blast using it, and the kiddos lined up to get a turn with it! While we were peeling, coring, and slicing the apples, we revisited the previous senses (sight, sound, smell, and touch). It was interesting to hear the kids compare their senses during this to what they had observed with the whole apples.

Once we had samples of each apple (red, green and yellow), we tasted them. After everyone had sampled each apple, we recorded each child’s favorite apple.

Related: Apple-Scented Water Sensory Play

After that was done, we kept using the handy-dandy apple peeler/corer/slicer until we were out of apples. Honestly, I think some of the children ate their weight’s worth of apples! I’m not going to argue with a nutritious snack, though.

As they were demolishing the apples, we reviewed all of the vocabulary discussed throughout this 5 senses apple activity. I loved hearing how the kids described the apples.

Make a Class Book about Apples

The following day, the children and I made a class book about our favorite apples. The oh-so-riveting title was “We Like Apples”, and every kiddo had a page (as did the teachers). Be sure to get a free printable copy of of the book at the very end of the post.

Related: Easy Apple Pie Sensory Play

My page said “Mary Catherine likes yellow apples”, and every page followed that same pattern. The pages got laminated when we were done, and we used a hole punch and binder clips to turn it into a class book for our reading center. A binding machine would do the trick as well.

What’s the big deal with the class book? Here’s my two cents:

• It contains predictable text, so it’s easier for the children to read.
• Every child has ownership over the book, since every child made a page of the book.
• It relates to a specific activity that all of the kiddos enjoyed.
• It contains sight words the children can learn.
• I could go on and on about this, but I’ll be nice and stop here. 🙂

Have you ever tried a 5 senses apple activity with the kids? If you taste tested apples, which did your children prefer?

Related: Apple Tasting and Graphing

More Apple-Themed Resources

Save time and get right to the playful learning with done-for-you lesson plans and educational activities for preschoolers. Click on the photos below for more information on our apple preschool lesson plans, 10 apples on top plans, and apple ten-frame task cards:

Get Your Free Printable

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