Moon Science & Poppins Book Nook

This moon science activity is super easy to set up and is always a huge hit with preschoolers!

 

Plus, it goes wonderfully with this month's Beyond Our Planet theme for Poppins Book Nook!

We'll get to the moon science activities in just a moment.  First, I want to share our book choice for the theme:
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I Took the Moon for a Walk is a delightful rhyming story perfect for preschoolers and toddlers.  Older children can even read it to the younger kiddos!  At the end of the fanciful tale, the book has some simple scientific information at the end too.  (If you click on the picture above, you can visit Amazon and see a preview that shows some of the pages inside, including one of the science information pages.)

After you enjoy the story, ask your children what they would do if they could take the moon for a walk?  What would they see?

Did they know that people have walked on the moon?  Did they know that three countries have put "cars" (moon rovers) on the moon?  Can you name them?  The Soviet Union, United States, and China.

Pull out a plate with a thin layer of flour on it to represent the moon.  Let your kiddos poke the ground and imagine they are astronauts bouncing along the moon.  Talk about gravity.  The moon is aobut 1/6 the size of the Earth, and so it has about 1/6 the amount of gravity.  A 4-year old who weighs 48 pounds on Earth would only weigh 8 pounds on the moon!

Pull out a moon rover (aka monster truck).  Let your kiddos drive it on the "moon."

Talk about more moon science:  there is no wind to blow away the tire tracks.  There is no water to wash away the prints.  The tracks from moon rovers are still there now, decades later!

If you wanted to add a second plate, you could let your children demonstrate what would happen to the tracks on Earth: they would get washed away by wind and water.

Before you turn your moon into an impromptu sensory bin, tell your kids that there is one thing that will destroy the prints on the moon: impact from meteorites!  Let your children demonstrate meteorites hitting the moon by dropping tiny rocks, balls, or raisins onto their moon from 1-2 feet above the plate!  Tell them that you can actually see craters on the moon when you look at it at night!  If you have a pair of binoculars or a telescope, you can see them even better!

Eventually, our moon science experiments turned into a sensory plate.  Luckily, flour is pretty easy to sweep up!

This post is part of the Poppins Book Nook monthly book club!  Be sure to stop for even more learning activities and great books on the Beyond Our Planet theme!  Plus, visit Enchanted Homeschooling Mom for a great giveaway!!

Check out these other bloggers for more Beyond Our Planet fun:

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom ~ 3 Dinosaurs ~ To the Moon and Back ~ Planet Smarty Pants ~ Farm Fresh Adventures ~ Growing in God’s Grace ~ Chestnut Grove Academy ~ Learning and Growing the Piwi Way ~ The Usual Mayhem~ Preschool Powol Packets ~ Monsters Ed Homeschool Academy ~ Adventures in Mommydom~Teach Beside Me ~ Life with Moore Babies ~ Kathy’s Cluttered Mind ~ Are We There Yet? ~ Our Crafts N Things~Hopkins Homeschool ~ ABC Creative Learning ~ Joy Focused Learning ~ P is for Preschooler ~ My Bright Firefly ~A Mommy’s Adventures ~ Inspiring 2 New Hampshire Children ~ World for Learning ~ Ever After in the Woods ~Golden Grasses ~ A glimpse of our life ~ Journey to Excellence ~ Happy Little Homemaker ~ Little Homeschool Blessings ~Raventhreads ~ Tots and Me ~ As We Walk Along The Road ~ Stir the Wonder ~ For This Season ~Where Imagination Grows ~ The Canadian Homeschooler ~ School Time Snippets ~ Peakle Pie ~ A Moment in our World ~Every Bed of Roses ~ Finchnwren ~ At Home Where Life Happens ~ The Library Adventure ~ Embracing Destiny ~Day by Day in our World ~ Our Homeschool Studio ~ A “Peace” of Mind ~ Thou Shall Not Whine ~ SAHM I am  ~Simple Living Mama

Do you have a post that would fit the theme?  We'd love to see your Beyond Our Planet ideas!  Just link them up here:

An InLinkz Link-up

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Happy Educating, Carla

I may share at any of these parties!



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