With a cook-pot for a hat and a seed spreader over his shoulder, Johnny Appleseed visited the pre-K and kindergarten classrooms at California Elementary School during Apple Week.
First-year teacher Sarah Russell called upon her husband, Jim Russell, to portray the American legend as a highlight of the kindergarten curriculum using apples to explore science, math, reading and social studies.
Kindergartener Lena Bieri has liked apples for a long-time, but she only learned of Johnny Appleseed this week.
"It was fun to meet him," she said.
Bieri said she also enjoyed the other apple-related lessons, such as naming the parts of the apple, including the leaf, stem and skin.
But her favorite part may have been the taste test, comparing red, yellow and green apples, where she discovered she likes the Granny Smith flavor best.
"I only had red ones before," she said.
Fellow classmate Roman Riggs said he enjoyed trying the new apple-flavored foods like apple butter and apple cider.
Although this is her first year in the California schools, Russell is in her 15th year of teaching.
She said she likes lessons where she can use a theme, like apples, to teach the various core subjects.
For example, they counted how many students preferred each of the three colors of apples for a math lesson.
For history, she was able to read books and talk about the early colonists, related to the Johnny Appleseed lore.
For science, they discussed the seasonal changes of an apple tree and how a tree goes "dormant" rather than "dying," when it loses its leaves, Russell said.
The apple week lessons would not have been possible without parent support, which provided the variety of apple foods for the week's tasting, she said.
"It's good to tie in something kids like to eat with so many other things," Russell said.