Our Astronomy Unit
For science, Monkey wanted to study space. She says she wants to be an astronaut when she grows up. She has been fascinated with the stars and moon since she was very small. I couldn't find a packaged curriculum that I wanted to use for astronomy in Kindergarten, so I pulled one together myself.
Resources:
Homeschoolshare lapbook materials
DK First Space Encyclopedia
Evan Moore Exploring Space
Intelligo Astronomy for K-2
Magic School Bus books and videos
Library
Google ;)
Monkey's favorite part of doing astronomy was lapbooking. This was our first real attempt at a lapbook (I did one when she was 3 on a picture book, it was a flop!) and we both really liked it. Monkey did as much of the work herself as she was able. Anything printed she had to determine where it went. She had a hard time with all the writing so some of it I finished but she told me what to put. Unless otherwise noted, the printables came from homeschoolshare. So here's our lapbook.
Front cover
The star in the upper left is a blank sticker over one just
like it that has "[monkey's name] age: 5, Kindergarten"
The solar system diagram is one I found just through a
quick search.
With the center flap lifted up.
In the center to the right is a spin wheel of the
different rotation times of each of the planets.
Top left: Glossary of astronomy terms.
Below: Space "riddles" from EM
Top: Planet temperatures. We started out doing average
daytime temp and average night time temp for each, but
then just did overall average temp.
Below: Layers of the sun. We used the same outline model
showing the different layers of the sun. I printed it 6 times
and we colored the appropriate layer for each.
Top: Star facts - a different fact on each paper
In the middle: Constellations. I used vellum to make two
copies each of 6 different constellations. One copy has just
the stars connected, the second copy has the picture of what
the constellation is supposed to represent and it's name. Both
can be used with our light box and layered to see how the
stars become the picture. (outlines came from EM)
Bottom: Phases of the moon
Facts about each of the planets. Each fact was printed
separately and she had to match the facts with the
correct planet.
Across is A Star is Born. This shows the stages of the
birth of a star. She had fun drawing her interpretation of
each stage.
On the right: Types of Galaxies. She loved doing this one
because we used glue and glitter to make the galaxies.
Sun facts. She did all of the writing on this one.
Facts about the moon
Space study timeline. The pictures came from EM.
Monkey really had a lot of fun doing the lapbook as well as all the activities we did with our astronomy unit. I'm glad she has the lapbook to keep and look over whenever she wants.
