What homeschool preschool space unit study would be complete without rockets, moon phases, and the solar system! We did lots of counting, fine motor work, and sensorial exploration!
Our preschool space unit study focuses mostly on astronauts and rockets and the international space station because that’s what Bitty finds interesting.
What part of space does your preschooler find super interesting?!
Books are our biggest learning tool for our preschool space unit study
You can find all of the awesome space books that we used for our homeschool preschool space unit study that we used in this post! There were so many I just couldn’t put everything in one post
Planning Homeschool Preschool Work Shelves
When I’m planning a unit study, I tend to plan about 10-12 activities to have on our work shelf and I try to have two of each of five major categories. This lesson plan will last us 2-3 weeks of “school” time.
Language– this could be things like working with a movable alphabet or introducing new vocabulary with three-part cards or phonics games
Numbers – this could be working with our colored beads, our red and blue rods, bead hangers or math link cubes
Sensorial – this is where you’ll see a lot of the traditional Montessori sensorial materials, things like the brown stair and the pink tower, knobbed cylinders, and knobless cylinders, but we’ll also have things that will work on differentiating size or weight.
Fine motor – this is where you’ll see things like beating lacing, sewing, cutting, and tracing
Other – this category sort of acts as an overflow for game schooling (bingo and memory), puzzles, and sorting activities. Really this is just where I plug in a couple more activities that I really want to add to the shelf even if they overlap with other categories.
Depending on how in-depth and how interested your little learner is could dictate if you need a rotation with further work on the topic
Bitty was still interested in Space after the initial lessons so I rotated most of the materials on our work shelf and we carried on with Space part 2.
Disclamer
This post contains some affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. I may receive a small commission from if you follow and decide to purchase. There would be no additional cost to you!
Preschool Space Unit 1 Works
Before I started planning our Homeschool Preschool Space Unit Study I asked Bitty what she was most interested in learning more about. Her answer was astronauts, rockets, and the ISS so that was a major focus for us! …but I couldn’t do a preschool Space unit and not talk about the planets and the moon, so I added those in as well!
Language Works
Planet 3 part cards and small model planets
We used them for matching activities as well as proper Montessori three-part lessons
My book of Space
Each day we focused on a singular planet and sort of narrowed down the three or four most notable things about it. We then created a page in a blank book for her to be able to “read” after
Number Works
DIY zero board w/rocket counters
This board helps reinforce the concept that zero means nothing and each other number gets bigger
DIY mini Red and Blue Rods w/ 10s frame Number cards
Another work to show that each number gets bigger and has a greater value than the previous
Sensorial Works
This is a 3D puzzle that in a very roundabout way teaches early algebra but for preschoolers it’s purely a 3D puzzle
Asteroid Weights – DIY
I scoured the house for a variety of objects of varying weights and then wrapped them in tin foil to create pairs that she would then have to try and match
A classic Montessori sensorial material that goes from a 1cm rectangular prism to a ten-centimeter rectangular prism
Fine Motor Works
Constellation tacks and bands
I’ve tried many times to get Bitty interested in pin poking. It has never taken with her. So this was another way where she would not have to pin poke around an entire shape She would just poke at each of the star points and then stretch a rubber band from point to point to create the constellation
DIY insets and highlighters
This is probably Bitty’s favorite work, simple geometric stencils to trace. You can mix and match them to make more complex drawings as well
Other Works
DIY felt phases of the moon puzzle w/ flash cards and poster
She set up the felt puzzle and use the poster to check her work or we used the cards to match the felt moons to
Space Station Stew Counting Recipe
Using a bunch of space-themed loose parts and some tongs to transfer into a pot. We have DIY recipe cards to tell her how many of each to add
Homeschool Space Unit Works 2.0
After about three weeks with the previous materials set out for our preschool space unit study, I could tell she was ready for a little refresh so while some of the language work and sensorial materials stayed I rotated everything else and set up Preschool Space Unit 2.0
Language Works
Planet 3 part cards and small model planets
My book of Space
Moveable alphabet w/ space words
Classic Montessori materials for letter recognition and writing
Number Works
A printable way to practice the different ways we write numbers
Bead Hanger frame 1-10
A DIY of a classic Montessori material where you match the colored beads to the correct location
Sensorial Works
A classic Montessori material that works on the gradation in size and/or width of sets of cylinders
DIY Color tablet box 3 with outerspace cards
Our version of a classic Montessori material, used to teach visual discrimination of shades of colors
Fine Motor Works
DIY wooden bead planet threading
I painted two sets of wooden beads to reflect the planets. The first set I pretty strong to show her the correct order. In the second set, she copied the pattern.
A printable Montessori material to work on scissor skills
Mood Dust Writing Tray
Armand dust is actually just sugar and I provided a stylus and some letter cards for practice writing letters
Other Works
DIY oversized Felt Space Puzzle
An oversized puzzle to try and illustrate some of the scale of the solar system as well as to work on the order of the planets
Nesting boxes are actually a great tool to teach the concept of place in the universe. The smallest box is the self and from there you step out each time so home, city, state, country etc etc. Betty actually found this lesson very interesting and repeated it many times.
Planet Patterns
Some round or oval Beads and a dowel. This was a more open-ended activity that I wanted to see what she would do with most often she created patterns or color sorted
Homeschool Space Unit Tot School Work
A few of the activities that I put out on the shelf are very geared towards my 18-month-old, in case we are working at the shelves when she is awake. In total transparency, we aren’t often over here in the mornings so these activities have been mostly ignored by Bean, but Bitty will occasionally go to them and that’s fine.
Pouring Planets
marbles to transfer between small jars this is a practical life and fine motor skill to pour the marbles and try to keep them from scattering all over
Posting Stars
coin box with stars to post, this works fine. Motor skills to get the stars in the right orientation to fit through the slot
Astroid Trasfering w/star tray
Some little silver sparkly foam balls and some tongs to transfer from their container. This works fine motor and also one-to-one correspondence which is an early math skill
Homeschool Preschool Space Crafts and Sensory Play
I will admit a fail on this part here. I had great intentions of using our art projects as another way to sort of reinforce what we were learning in our preschool space unit…Life got in the way. Halloween got in the way. She chose Halloween activities and because of that we did very few space crafts and I’m sad because I found some really cool projects that I think would have been a lot of fun!
I’m going to share where I found the original ideas down below, I just wish that I could share more of our version of these projects! Know that chances are you won’t have time to do them all, unless you have an art-obsessed preschooler. Pick and choose which ones suit your family and your time best!
Preschool Space Unit Craft Ideas
- Paper plate sun
- Watercolor planets
- Chalk Galaxy
- Planet coloring pages
- Build a shape rocket
- Create a constellation
Preschool Space Unit Sensory Play
- Moon sand and craters
- Fizzing moon rocks
- Icy Comet Water Play – dye the water black, ad biodegradeable glitter and add sphere ice cubes and play
- Black bean sensory bin w/ glow in the dark stars and magentic tile rocket
Need more ideas for a preschool Space Unit Study?!?
Then you should definitely check out my Homeschool Space Unit Pinterest Board!!! It’s full of these ideas and so many more others that we just didn’t have time for!
Our Homeschool Space Unit was an Out of this World Success!
You’ll have to excuse the pun, but we spent probably six weeks on our preschool space unit and by the end of it she wasn’t bored! She was still interested. She still wanted to learn more!
We just reached the end of my capability to teach more. lol
I Hadn’t prepared more than two lesson plans for our space unit… Not to mention that we were starting to get into some topics that I just could not figure out how to present to a preschooler.
So I’m sure we will revisit space again probably over the summer.
Other Post you may like
How did you make the zero board?
This is a custom design that my husband and I made using our CNC machine!