During the fall season, a great theme to plan for your speech therapy caseload is an apple theme!
Your students can relate to apples because they are snacking on them, baking with them, and enjoying sweet drinks like apple cider!
Today, I will share all my best tips and ideas for making an apple sensory bin. Using a sensory bin after reading an apple-themed book can be a great way to keep your students engaged while also working on vocabulary from the theme.
Apple Sensory Bin Filler Ideas
Here are some of my favorite apple sensory bin fillers (Amazon affiliate links):
Shredded red or green paper
Red or green pom poms
Dyed dry pasta red or green
Must-Have Apple Materials for Your Bin
One of my favorite finds is these plastic apples. You can add them to a sensory bin, set them up as a dramatic play apple stand, or hide them around your speech room. I love that I can use my apple-themed verb and vocabulary set from the Themed Therapy SLP membership by printing four to a page. Check out a demo on my Instagram.
Need some apples to throw in your bin? Use these fake apples from Michaels. They are just the right size to be thrown into a sensory bin!
To make an apple orchard, you need toilet paper rolls or dixie cups. You can see more on Instagram. Cut slits on both sides, print out some apple trees and slide the trees onto the toilet paper roll. You can then add those to your bins. If you need printables for apple trees, the ones in the picture are from the Themed Therapy SLP membership.
Apple-Themed Speech Therapy Activities for Prek-5th Grade
If you don’t want to stress about planning themed therapy, join the Themed Therapy SLP membership. It’s designed to take lesson planning off your plate so you can enjoy your speech therapy sessions. Join here!
How To Use These Apple Sensory Bins in Speech Therapy
One of the BEST ways to use themed sensory bins is to pair them with a book. You can reinforce all the vocabulary or use the bin as a story retell prop kit. If you want to see an example of a story prop kit, check out the one I shared about Apple Trouble.
For the apple orchard sensory bin, you can drop the pom poms in the dixie cups or the toilet paper rolls. You can work on in/out, up/down, fall, pick, gather, eat, bite, etc.
Furthermore, you can turn it into a game where the student rolls the die and sees how many apples they can pick.
For the bins with the plastic apples, put mini trinkets with your student’s sounds, and work on inferencing by putting small picture cards inside and having students guess. Before putting the apples in a bin, have students find all the apples that fell from the tree. Put them around your room and give receptive language commands to reinforce spatial concepts.
When students select a plastic apple in the bin, you can target open/close, in/out, look, what, find, etc. Have your student work on placing the apples in and out of a basket and other basic concepts.
When using the apple sensory bin with the fake apples from Michael’s, put your favorite speech or language flashcards in the bin with paper clips attached! Then, your students can select the cards with a magnetic wand. Have your students put their flashcards on the table. Give your students clues for items; they can cover them up with a fake apple when they find them.
How Would You Use These Apple-Themed Sensory Bins in Your Sessions?
SLPs have the best tips and ideas for maximizing the use of material with students. Considering your speech therapy caseload, how would you use these bins to work on goals? Share in the comments to help give SLPs more ideas for re-purposing these themed bins.
Need more apple-themed ideas? Check out these blog posts: