This coming weekend, our family will head up to Salem, IN for our yearly day of fun at the Maple Syrup Festival. We absolutely love this festival, and feel pretty much the same about maple syrup itself. This is a family outing that we look forward to year after year. If you have a maple syrup festival in your neck of the woods, I highly recommend checking it out. At this one, we are able to see how maple syrup is made, eat delicious pancakes with the syrup, and visit booths were maple syrup is highlighted in foods (maple syrup cotton candy!) and crafts. There’s even a Native American who demonstrates how maple syrup was made hundreds of years ago in hollowed-out logs!
Whether or not your family is able to visit a maple syrup festival, you can still enjoy delicious foods made with maple syrup and learn more about its history and how its made via books, videos, and unit studies. This is a delicious topic to study for children of all ages!
Maple Syrup Resources for Homeschool
Book Basket
Sugarbush Spring by Marsha Wilson Chall
Sugar Snow by Laura Ingalls Wilder
At Grandpa’s Sugar Bush by Margaret Carney
Sugar on Snow by Nan Parson Rossiter
Sugaring by Jesse Haas
The Sugaring-Off Party by Jonathan London
The Maple Syrup Book by Janet Eagleson
Websites
Watch how homemade maple syrup is made
Read about the history of maple syrup
Take a walk through a Vermont Sugar House
Unit Studies
Maple Syrup unit study with lapbook from HSS (free)
Enjoy this FREE Maple Syrup unit study from Leanne and Michael’s Sugar Bush
Download these Maple Syrup Printables
If you’re really brave (and have the right trees), use the information from Tap My Trees to make your own maple
syrup like this family from My Little Poppies!
Arts, Crafts and Cooking
Make a Maple Leaf out of tissue paper
Create a beautiful maple leaf using origami
Learn about the symmetry of maple leaves with this fun art project
Make Maple Cream Candy
Make these yummy energy bites with maple syrup
Learn about the four grades of maple syrup by making maple syrup play dough