School Tours can be designed for students of all ages, including preschoolers. In fact, the majority of the tours given have been to younger age groups. We encourage you to come during bloom in May. Or in September and October when are in the midst of harvesting our crop.

Please note that tours are not limited to school groups.

The following list is a menu of activities. You select whats best for your class:

II. Tractor drawn hay wagon ride through the orchard. (20-mins)

III. Apple picking- individual bags to take home or big bag for the class. Pumpkin picking in season, small individual pumpkins or large class pumpkin (apple picking 20-30 mins., pumpkin picking 10-15 mins.)

IV. Visit the reindeer. You’ll be very well received if you have apple slices for them! (10-15 mins.)

V. Cider making and tasting, with fresh, homemade doughnuts for snack (30-45 mins.)

VI. Back to school with apple orchard coloring book and or pumpkin farm coloring book, recipes.

Pricing is as follows:

The whole package (all activities) $4.50 per student (chaperones and siblings free)

*It’s a good idea to plan on a couple of hours if you want to do everything and you have a big group. Big groups can be divided into 2 or 3 smaller groups that can rotate through the various activities.

As a teacher, here are some tips you may want to consider before bringing your class to the orchard:

Prepare your class and yourself for inclement weather and field conditions. The orchard is located on hillsides and has cool breezes and wet morning grasses. Don't forget bee kits if you have students who are allergic.

Plan pre-visit classroom activities and discussions to stimulate curiosity and to help the children develop questions that they can research at the orchard. In order to help the children think of the questions, give them categories and record their ideas under the separate headings. Example: jobs, people, machines, trees, seasons, or who,what,when,where,why.

Plan some after the visit activities such as

• Make individual or class books.
• Make a "Jeopardy" type game with the information everyone has gathered.
• Make up a quiz to give parents, or another class, or the chaperones.
• Make a mural of the orchard based on sketches Have an apple tasting parents night.
• Plan an off season visit to the orchard to see what is different.

And, please remember:

The orchard is a busy place! While we have made a commitment to teaching children about apples, this is not our primary job. Please be active in the control of your class and careful in the selection of your chaperones. Orchards are full of equipment and workers who are rushing to get the crop harvested and stored and there may be additional schools or classes visiting at the same time.