The Educators' Spin On It

Learning Games and Activities

By 18 Comments

Mini Apple Pie Recipe: Little Hands that Cook with Books

A perfect recipe for fall with kids! Create this easy to bake mini apple pie recipe with your child.

A fun way to learn about baking in the kitchen with an apple themed book for kids.

mini apple pie

 Making Mini Apple Pie with Kids

We had our first Kids Cooking Class this afternoon and we learned all about Apples!  In my cooking class, I try my best to incorporate literature and print as much as I can. Reading is a part of everyday life and it’s so easy to make it real with cooking.

I also teach science and math and art during cooking too!  That’s what makes cooking one of the best things you can do with your child!

We read the book The Apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall.

(Amazon affiliate links included)

This is one of my favorite books to discuss apples, seasons, changes and life cycles just by the life around a simple apple tree in the backyard.

Once we read the book I had a large sheet of paper for the chefs to decide what they thought would taste best in an apple pie.  With a little guidance, we got all of our ingredients listed.

Then we discussed what types of cooking tools we would need to find to prepare our apple pie.  We found a bowl, spoon, child-safe knife, tablespoon, teaspoon, rolling pin, pie plate, and measuring cup. 

I created an assorted pile of cooking terms for the girls to search through to label our items with.

Apple Pie Recipe for Kids

Apple Pie Dough Recipe

We used premade pie dough. You can precut circles for your child to place inside the mini pie containers

Apple Pie Filling Recipe

  1. Peel one apple and then cut in half
  2. Slice the apple into small pieces
  3. Mix 1 Tablespoon packed brown sugar
  4. MIx 1 Tablespoon white sugar
  5. Mix 1 teaspoon all-purpose flour
  6. Add a pinch of cinnamon
  7. Add a pinch of nutmeg
  8. Mix ingredients all together
  9. Put mixture into pie container
  10. Put 1 teaspoon button on top
  11. Bake for 15 minutes or until brown
  12. Enjoy

Once we established our ingredients we found the recipe with all of those terms on it and read over it together as we gathered and identified our ingredients. Each chef was in charge of cutting their apple into small slices using a butter knife. 

We talked about how to keep our fingers out of the way for knife safety.  (The riper they are the easier they are to cut for little hands.) 

Then they added their ingredients based on the recipe to their diced apples and placed it into a miniature pie plate. We baked the pies for 30 minutes.

While we were waiting we sang a few apple songs and read another non-fiction apple book. We discussed the different kinds of apples and we taste-tested yellow, green and red apples and discussed how some are sweet and some are tart.

We created an apple art project by creating legs and arms by folding them accordion style and then attaching them with glue.  Then they personalized their apple with a face.

Then it was time to enjoy our finished product!  This week we will incorporate some Apple Literacy projects to enforce what we learned using the songs we learned and a child created book with sight words!

Check out more of The Educators’ Spin On It Apple Activities here:

Apple Activities for Kids 

If you’re looking for more ways to enrich your child’s apple learning check out these sites!

Apple Unit by 2 Teaching Mommies

Apple Pie Tree Lapbook Lesson

Counting Apples Math Activity for Preschooler and Toddlers
STEM Activity for Ten apples Up On Top for Kids
STEM activities with Apples for back to school STEM.

Preschool Apple Lesson Plan for Preschoolers 

Counting Apples

Apple Sight Word Tree

75+ Apple Theme Preschool Activities

Mini apple pies for kids to make with apples in background for learning how to cut safely.

Apple Books for Kids

Like this idea? Pin for later or share now with a friend!

Comments

  1. Love, love, love these activities. I may be a little biased though =) Elly had such a fun time at your cooking class. Have I told you lately what an awesome friend you are????

    Reply

  4. Thanks! We're working on reading our own recipes so it's one of the beginning steps to identifying those words. My daughters loves sorting kitchen items to match the words too.

    Reply

  5. I read The Apple Pie Tree for the first time this year. I saw it in the display at my son's preschool classroom. Super book for showing the seasons.

    I highly recommend the Curious Chef knives for kids. I've given them as gifts to several friends. My kids like having their own safe knife. They work really well for cutting apples (without skin of course.)

    Reply

  8. Thanks Deb for adding us to your Apple Unit Study on pinterest and for becoming a follower. I'm just getting started on Pinterest, but it seems like a great resource.

    Reply

  12. Thanks Bern! I love trying to incooperate reading and print whenever I can to show them how it's in our every day lives… plus they learn so quickly that way.

    Reply

  15. Such a cute lesson idea and a good way to involve kids in baking too 🙂 Stopping by from the Living Life Intentionally link-up!

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You Might Also Like

Let’s Connect!