Preschoolers love it when you ask for their opinions! Tell them you have a dilemma. You’re trying to figure out which kind of apple tastes the best, but you’re not sure. Ask how you could figure that out? They may suggest (perhaps with some guidance) that you have a taste test!
There are so many different types of apples out there, you could have a different kind each day, and probably still not get through them all in a year! For simplicity’s sake, I use red (Red Delicious), green (Granny Smith), and yellow (Golden Delicious). Give each child a sample of each. Once they have tried them all. Have each child, one by one, come place a picture of their favorite apple, one on top of the other, on the graph you have prepared. You are essentially building a picture graph, which is probably the easiest one for young children to understand.
Once everyone has placed the picture of their favorite apple onto the graph, look at it together and discuss what you’ve found. Each child still has his/her own favorite, but we can easily see which kind of apple most people like the best. Discuss the graph using questions like: Which one do the most people like? How many people liked that one best? Which kind did the least number of people choose as their favorite? How many chose that one? If I wanted to give a whole apple to each person, how many of each kind do I need to buy?And on and on! Building and discussing this picture graph builds math and language skills.
You could use apple pictures you printed from the computer or cut out of construction paper. Somewhere, I’m sure, there are plenty of you lucky people with a die cut or cricut that could whip out several apples in a hurry. I cut mine from felt and used them on a flannel board for our graph. Whichever method you use, these apples can be used again for a patterning activity (red, yellow, red, yellow, etc.) as well as to illustrate the 10 Little Apples Song! I love multipurposing!
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