outer space activities for preschoolers
Outer Space Activities for Preschoolers
Looking for something innovative to engage the preschool kids? Here is our collection of outer space activities for preschoolers that will get them interested in exploring the universe and also teach them a little about our solar system and more.
- Create a 3-d model of our solar system out of clay or paper and explain it to the kids.
- Conduct an activity to have them remember the names or some fun facts about the planets. You could give them a line like "My Very Earnest Mother Just Served Us Nice Pudding" (where the first letter of each word stands for a planet's name) or ask them to come up with a line of their own.
- Organize an art and craft activity for the preschoolers, where they model the entire solar system or some planets in it.
- Conduct a word game where they complete the spellings of planets.
- Have a quiz where you say a letter and the kids are needed to give you a planet's name starting from it.
- Show them pictures (online or from books) about how the planets look, whether they have rings, whether they are hot or cold, and so on.
- Give them paper cutouts of planets and have the kids color them, and/or stick them on a chart paper.
- Take the kids to an open space and arrange for a telescope. Let them view the planets.
- Have them create drawings of the outer space.
- Give them a "Match the pairs" quiz to match objects in space with their colors or shapes, or pictures of celestial bodies (such as the Sun, Moon, or the stars) with their names.
- On a drawing or model of anything related to outer space (our solar system or the night sky, for example), let the kids take turns to point out/label the objects they know.
- Give them cards with facts like "Venus is almost the size of the Earth" or "the Moon is smaller than the Sun", and so on. Then give them an exercise to arrange various bodies in space in the order of their size (You could give them ping-pong balls of different sizes and colors).
- Give them statements like "the Earth is bigger than the Moon" and have them draw the two showing the difference in their sizes.
- Give the kids some simple facts about the distances between planets or other bodies in space. For instance, tell them that Venus is closest to the Earth and that Pluto is the farthest from Earth. Now give them three ping-pong balls representing the three bodies and ask the kids to arrange them such that the difference in the distances is shown.
- Teach them to count from 1 to 9 while they also learn the planet names.
- Create a model of the solar system and draw their attention to the differences in the sizes of different planets.
- Show the children interesting videos of space flights, how a rocket takes off, a space mission, the moon landing, etc.
- Show them pictures of astronomers giving them a brief account of each one's work.
- Give them some interesting information about famous space research organizations.
- Take the children to a nearby planetarium.
- Have a fancy dress competition themed 'alien'.
- Have the kids take turns to tell imaginary stories of aliens.
- Collect fun experiences that people claim to have had with aliens and narrate their stories to the kids.
- Have the kids draw aliens as they imagine them to be.
- Create a jigsaw puzzle of an alien figure and have the kids solve it.
- Have them enact alien behavior.
- Help them find words related to aliens or give them such words and their meanings.
- Make coloring pages based on the theme.