Learning Red, Apples

Colleen Beck OTR/L
Colleen Beck, OTR/L is a pediatric occupational therapist and the owner and author of The OT Toolbox website. She manages all of The OT Toolbox social media accounts and runs the popular newsletter. Colleen created The OT Toolbox in 2011 and since then has written thousands of blog posts designed to support therapy providers, educators, parents, counselors, admin, and caregivers in promoting the healthy development of kids. Check out Colleen's blog posts below:

I love this apple balance beam that we made years ago. It’s a gross motor coordination activity that targets areas like motor planning, balance, coordination, core strength, and sensory motor input, all needed for development! This gross motor apple activity would go really well with our apple sensory bin and our Apple Therapy Kit.

Apple Tree Balance Beam

Making an apple tree balance beam is an easy activity that you can do at home to work on skills with young kids!

This Apple Gross Motor Activity is the perfect way to introduce learning about the color Red and Apples this Fall with toddlers, preschoolers, and babies.  We made our own life-size apple tree (well, make that Toddler-life size!) that kids can really climb and develop gross motor skills while learning.  We’ve recently update our Toddler Play page with all of our play ideas in one place.  Your Toddler will love some of the other creative play ideas we’ve shared in the past.
 
Gross Motor Apple Tree activity for learning red and apples with toddlers and preschool children. Kids love this in the Fall!
 
 

Gross Motor Apple Activity for Toddlers and Preschoolers

So, two days a week, I have my nephew here with us while my sister is working.  That makes a 5 year old, 3 year old, 1 year old, and 11 and 1/2 month old.  We had a Red/Apple play day one afternoon, with something for each age to love! (This post contains affiliate links.)
 
Even with two children in two different stages of preschool (3 y/o class and Pre-K), it is easy to supplement school lessons at home (and keep the babies occupied).  Keeping the activities PLAY makes learning fun.  They never know that you are actually teaching so many ideas (turn taking, manners, colors, handwriting, developing motor skills…& so much more)!
 

 This time of year, it is all about apples in preschool. My 3 year old is learning all about red, apples, and circles in his class. We pulled those concepts into our play with this fun apple tree activity.  I placed this set up on our living room floor and had the kids pick ‘apples’. We counted them as we put them into baskets.  My 5 year old loves writing when I spell out a word, and so we worked on writing the words “red”, “apple”, “circle”, and “tree”.  She was “in charge” of  simple math ideas (We have two apples in the basket. Adding one more apple makes 3 apples).

 

The babies loved putting the red balls into baskets, taking them back out and then putting them into a different basket.  They are learning through exploring!

 
 


We did some Gross Motor balance beam play on the “trunk” of the tree. This was a hit for all of the kids.  These babies WATCH the big kids and try their hardest to keep up!

 
 
Gross Motor Apple Tree activity for learning red and apples with toddlers and preschool children. Kids love this in the Fall!
 
Gross Motor skills are tasks that require the large movements of the body.  Development of gross motor movement is important for so many play skills of childhood (riding a bike, throwing and catching a ball, hopping, skipping, climbing).  Developmentally, we refine our fine motor skills after and as a result of, appropriate gross motor skills. For example: Stable shoulder girdle strength is needed to produce controlled fine motor control needed to hold the pencil and write in a small area.
 

Baby Apple Theme and Red Learning Activities

The big kids did a few more motor tasks including tossing the balls into the baskets.  The controlled balance needed to stand on the balance beam, while tossing the ball into the basket is really working their eye hand coordination and can be a challenge for many kids!  
 
(The babies had a blast carrying the baskets around).
 
We went on a search for red toys, keeping with the red theme. These were put into a pretzel tub that we keep to store the baby pop-beads.
 
Babies love to manipulate objects, explore how they can move objects…love to see what they can do to a toy (chew it, bang it, throw it…).  And then see if they can do it again!  
Baby Girl is always putting these stacking rings onto her wrist. She’ll walk all over the house with one on her wrist, just like a bracelet. My other two never did that at this age! Is she a future fashionista??? Have your babies done this???
 
The babies loved pulling red objects out of the bin, chewing on a few, putting them back in (…pulling them away from each another, grabbing it back with a screech…these two cousins are more like siblings…LOL)
 
This is a great opportunity for language development.  Say each item that baby has.  Babies, at this age, love to hear your voice in different pitches.  Describe to baby the details of a toy, pointing out interesting parts.  Talking constantly to baby truly does wonders for their language development.

 

We finished up with a snack of sliced apples for the big kids and applesauce for the babies.
 
This post was originally posted in 2012.  We’ve recently updated to share with you again!
 

Our favorite ways to work on gross motor skills:

3 thoughts on “Learning Red, Apples”

  3. Pingback: Super Fun Dinosaur Game Kids - The OT Toolbox

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