Learning about the Moon for Kids

The moon is always a fun topic for kids because it’s around all the time but always changing and there are lots of educational and crafting activities available to learn about the moon.

I’ve shared a few in the past, including this phases of the moon flip book and a project about coding the phases of the moon.

Check out some cool pictures of our moon, other moons, and what it might be like to live and work on the moon with these images from NASA. And you can learn about the moon landing from National Geographic Kids.

Learn about the phases of the moon and do these dot-to-dot worksheets for the different phases from Kids Activities Blog. I also love this homemade moon phases puzzle form What We Do All Day.

I Can Teach My Child has a fun experiment illustrating why there are craters on the moon, made with “moon dough” (flour and baby oil). Or you can make a clay moon and give it craters with this activity from Gift of Curiosity.

There are lots of fun ways to make moon rocks, including this dough and glitter version from Kids Activities Blog and fizzing moon rocks from Little Bins for Little Hands.

Speaking of fizzy science, Montessori from the Heart has a fun moon craft project that’s made with baking soda, vinegar and glitter. So you can talk about the acid/base reaction and learn about the moon at the same time you make a cool piece of art.

Or make this fun aluminum foil moon from Mom Brite.

Cinta and Co. has a cute phases of the moon art project and information you can download about the phases of the moon.

And of course you’ll probably want to make the classic Oreo moon phases craft/snack, which you can find at Teach Mama if you don’t know it already.

Add in some books about the moon (The Moon Book is a great one), a sensory bin with moon sand and astronaut characters, maybe a little walking with big steps like you’d take on the moon (and a discussion of why they walk like that) and your moon day will be complete!

Coding the Phases of the Moon

DIY Moon Craft [Lesson Plans]

DIY Space Camp for Kids

Pairing learning with activities and games is the best way to get kids to learn, and there are a lot of ways to make math centers to help kids learn numbers, number order, one to one correspondence and more.

Each of those skills could probably be its own post, but let’s delve a little deeper into some ideas for math centers for early learners.

Ten frames are a classic for learning to count and understanding numbers. It’s just a grid of five columns and two rows to start with, so you can draw one by hand or on your computer, or make one out of tape on the floor like this version from Busy Toddler. It includes an activity using a deck of cards and little toys to count out the number you see.

Similarly, this dot sticker math activity from Happy Toddler Playtime uses Uno cards and has kids peel and stick the number they see on the card. You can do this with stickers of any kind, dot markers or whatever manipulatives you have on hand, from pom poms to little erasers.

Peeling stickers is a great fine motor activity addition to the math center, and another take on that is this one from Laughing Kids Learn, where she wrote numbers in muffin liners. Kids can use tongs or tweezers to pick up pompoms to place the correct number in each liner. You could also use plastic cups for this.

And speaking of cups, any cup with a rim (these are actually Styrofoam, not plastic) can be used to make an easy number tower activity for your math center. This one is from The Activity Mom and is super simple to set up. You could actually use the same cups for different activities such as stacking the cups in order, doing odd and even numbers or placing items in the cups.

While kids are learning the numbers in order they can play with this missing number math activity from Planning Playtime. It uses supplies you probably already have — craft sticks and clothespins — and is another great fine motor skill builder at the same time it teaches math skills.

These last few are paid but they’re cute so I couldn’t help sharing. Use unit cubes to build a city with building of differing heights with this printable from Preschool Activities. Or count with plastic links with this one from The Kinderhearted Classroom. I also love the flip, make and build printable from Blocks and Beads that helps teach counting up to 10.

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