16 Jan Five in a Row: How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World

As the weather slowly turned cool, ushering in fall, our next Five in a Row adventure seemed an obvious one: How to Make an Apple Pie and see the World. Growing up, I have some wonderful memories of my parents taking us each fall to the apple orchards to pick bushel after bushel of apples. They were the best apples I have ever tasted. Right off the tree, they were cold, crisp and delicious. Unfortunately, we don’t have the opportunity to pick bushels of apples in apple orchards, but we can bake an apple pie!

How to Make and Apple Pie

With the assistance of my two little helpers – who were only there for the final product and the hope to play with some dough, I think – we mixed up my family’s super secret apple pie recipe.  Don’t bother asking for the recipe because the only answer you can get is: “Ohhh… just throw a few apples into a bowl, add some flour, you know, just enough to get the right consistency, some brown sugar and a dash of cinnamon.  Cook it until its a golden brown and bubbling.”  Really.  Don’t bother.  It’s a crap shoot.

My History with Pies

I have a love-hate relationship with pies.  Love, because who doesn’t love a pie.  Hate because many years ago, when I was a teenager, my family used to make pies to sell.  We would hand-peel and cut every single apple, and make literally HUNDREDS of pies a day.  So needless to say, once that adventure was over, I would have been happy if I NEVER saw another pie crust again in my LIFE. And for the past 25 years or so, I have not made a legit pie.  No joke.

I have actually made a few “non-legit” pies, where I would secretly buy the pre-made crusts and filling at the grocery store, thinking:  “Oh if my Mother ever knew!”  The resulting pies were so pathetic, that each time I swore I would never do it again.  And this last attempt at a pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving was truly my last attempt.  The filling was disgusting, but even worse was the crust, which actually shrunk to about the size of a quarter.  I was so mad at it all that I just dumped the filling into the pie pan anyways.  But, this time I vowed if I ever made a pie again, I would go back to my roots and make it from scratch.  So this is a big deal, folks!

Here it is, in all it’s pre-cooked glory.  I honestly just took this picture in case the whole thing shrunk again.  But it DIDN’T!  It came out without any shrinkage and it was delish!  Especially with a dollop of ice cream!  What a great way to start off a book study!

Geography

In her search for ingredients for her apple pie, the little girl in the book goes on a long adventure, travelling to 6 different countries.  As we read the story, we mapped out the girl’s journey on our map with string, learning a little about each country from the illustrations.  We also checked out some books from the library to learn a little more.

Honestly, all the different countries were initially overwhelming to Clark and Luci, so we decided to make some “Play Passports” to help us remember and to document our “travels.”  I blogged about this in greater detail HERE and included a FREE printable so that you can make your own “Play Passports.”

We also found it helpful to play a matching game as we read the book.  We found one online from FIAR Circle, which we downloaded and used.  As we read, Clark and Luci found the corresponding location, transportation and ingredient cards to match where the girl in the book was going.

We spent an entire day learning about each of the different countries visited in the book.  

Culinary Adventures

To add a little adventure, we planned our day’s meals around the countries we were going to be learning about.  For lunch, we made some delicious Einkorn wheat crepes and I told the children about my visit to France, many years ago.  It seemed on each street corner they were selling crepes.  You could choose the topping and they would cook them in front of you and roll them up with the topping.  They were so delish!  Clark and Luci wanted bananas (we had talked about them growing in Jamaica) and maple syrup, and I have to say, I think these may have been even better than the ones I tasted in France!

While learning about Italy, we learned that they are known for their pizza and gelato.  So for dinner, we had both!  We ordered our favorite pizza, with pineapple chunks and bacon.

I let Clark and Luci choose which flavor of gelato they wanted.  Luci, a girl after my own heart, chose chocolate, and Clark chose salted caramel.  This was a rare treat and boy, was it good!

Art

For our art project, we made apple trees by tracing Clark and Luci’s hands.  You can read more about this project by clicking on the picture below.

Math

We incorporated math into this row when we baked our apple pie.  Clark helped with reading the recipe and we reviewed basic measurements using the fractions on the measuring cups.

Science

Of course, as part of our book study, we had to learn about apples!  So we checked out some books from the library that were all about apples and we watched some videos.  We found some awesome Apple Life Cycles Worksheets from Mama’s Learning Corner. They were a great way to help us learn the names of all of the pieces of an apple.

FREE Apple Printable

We then used the apple illustration to make our own cut-out apple “puzzles.”  I wrote a blog post about it HERE, which includes a FREE printable of the apple and pieces.  Using the puzzle – one of Luci’s favorite things, Clark and Luci pieced together the puzzle to create a apple cross-section.

We finished our study of this book by talking about the importance of fresh food for health.  We’ve been working together as a family to improve our diet, focusing on eating fresh foods instead of processed foods.  The girl in the book took the cow along with her for the “freshest possible results.”  We talked about how fresh foods have much more of the nutrients that out bodies need, in comparison to the processed foods.

The Beauty of Five in a Row

This was a fun book to read.  It was simple enough that Clark could read it, so several times, he did the reading and Luci did the narrating.  Overall, we got very distracted during this row with holidays, family visits and time off, so it was a very extended row.  But that’s the beauty of Five in a Row, in my opinion – it’s flexible and adaptable.