Do you have a little learner who is “out of this world” excited about space?! This Space preschool pack is perfect for combining your child’s interest with academic practice! It’s one of our favorite “anytime” themes, which means it has no specific seasonal or monthly theme and can be used ANY time during the school year!
Whether you’re teaching in the classroom or at home, you’ll love how easy it is to bring this stellar theme to life without the overwhelm of planning it all yourself. Below you’ll find tons of activities and tips!
Table of Contents – CLICK to jump ahead!
Space Theme Sensory Bin
One of the easiest ways to add excitement and hands-on learning to your preschool week is with a themed sensory bin. So many of the activities in our Space Preschool pack incorporate a sensory bin, so it’s best to knock out the preparation early on! Our space sensory bin is always a hit—it’s simple to put together and offers tons of playful learning opportunities! Here’s how I like to set ours up!
FIRST, gather your materials. I like to use a plastic storage bin with a lid so I can cover and store the bin once it’s prepared. Choose your filler, like the dry black beans we use in ours. Something about the beans really makes all the colors in our space sensory bin activities POP and gives children a very unique texture to experience. Once you’ve chosen your filler, fill your storage bin as much as you feel comfortable with (knowing each individual child can handle working with different amounts of materials).
NEXT, grab some extra space themed items like plastic planets, puffy stickers, star mini erasers, colorful pompoms, etc. These items make the perfect backdrop for the printable items in our preschool space activities! Scatter them throughout your sensory bin filler and watch the theme really come to life!
FINALLY, choose a space that you feel comfortable using the sensory bin with your child. I tuck ours away in our homeschool room with the rest of our Preschool manipulatives, and keep our sensory bin blanket nearby for when it’s time to get to work. The rule with our bins – everything stays on the blanket! This makes clean up SO much easier.
READY, SET, PLAY!!! When your sensory bin is not being used for the printable activities in our Space Preschool theme, allow children to explore freely! Watch them scoop, pour, dig, and more! I love taking our bin our when I need a little extra quiet time for homeschooling an older child, or honestly if I just need an extra minute to sip my hot coffee!
Space Preschool Theme Overview
This Space Preschool theme is sure to give your little learners TONS of fun practice! Children will have 15 center-style activities to choose from – 5 Math, 5 Literacy and 5 Fine Motor centers. In addition, I’ve included book recommendations for 5 space theme picture books and links to their read aloud videos on YouTube!
To use these printables, you can follow the PRE-MADE lesson plans for a week full of fun! Each of the 5 pre-planned days your students will have 1 read aloud, 1 Math activity, 1 Literacy activity, and 1 Fine Motor activity to work on. This is a great pace for little learners! But if you’d like to spread the activities out or rearrange them according your own child’s needs, simply print our provided Build-Your-Own Plans page and make your own plans!
PS See how we use this theme in our Preschool scope and sequence by grabbing our FREE Preschool Curriculum Map below!
Math Activities
This set of printables has 5 fun Space Preschool theme activities for practicing early Math skills. Children will practice number formation, number identification, counting, colors, and shapes. Our Preschool activities always include the use of small manipulatives for added fine motor skills practice!
One of my favorite space theme Math activities is the activity shown above! We LOVE using clip cards in our Preschool learning time! Squeezing the clothespins on their answer is such a great way to strengthen finger muscles, and is a welcome change from recording sheets! To use this activity, children identify the number on the sun. Then they use a clothespin to clip the matching number on the moons. *If children aren’t quite ready for using clothespins, lay the cards flat on your work area and use manipulatives from the sensory bin to cover their answers instead!*
Want to extend this activity? Once children identify and click the number on their card, guide them in counting up to that number or even counting that number on their fingers to connect the number to the amount it represents!
Literacy Activities
In addition to the Math centers, this set includes 5 early Space Preschool Literacy activities! Children will practice skills like letter identification, letter formation, beginning sounds, and handwriting practice with space theme vocabulary words!
One of my favorite Literacy activities from our space theme is the one shown above. To use, children choose cocoa letter cards from their sensory bin and identify the letters on them. Then they use manipulatives from their sensory bin to cover the picture that begins with that sound! They’ll continue until all of the space pictures on the mat are covered.
Fine Motor Activities
When working with little learners, strengthening fine motor skills is a must! Our 5 Space theme fine motor activities will have your children working hard and having TONS of fun! They will practice matching using clothespins, mold using play dough, trace using manipulatives, and so much more!
Some of my very favorite fine motor activities are these play dough prompt cards! To use, children use play dough to mold the different space pictures on the cards. And if they’re ready, children then use a dry erase marker to trace the space word at the bottom of each card for extra vocabulary practice!
And… I lesson planned FOR YOU!
This set of activities (and all of the other 45+ sets in our FULL Preschool Curriculum) include a full week of print and go visual lesson plans! It shows you exactly which books and printables to use each day for a 5-day school week, making lesson planning an absolute breeze!
Want to build your own? Or maybe your kiddos are ready for some of the activities but not all of them? That’s great! Use the included Build Your Own lesson plans page! These thematic centers were designed with growing learners ages 2.5 to 5 years old in mind, so this lesson planning page allows you to choose which activities your child is ready for right now!
More January fun!
Ready to learn with your toddlers or Preschoolers ALL MONTH LONG?! You can save TONS when you grab this set of centers in our January Preschool Curriculum! The bundle includes 3 engaging January themes (like Winter, polar animals, and more!), complete with a week of lesson plans for each! You’ll also get 25 NO PREP Winter themed fine motor skills worksheets and crafts, and 38 NO PREP Math and Literacy worksheets for extended practice!
Let’s hang out!
I hope this post helped you get a better look at our Space Theme Preschool activities! Got questions? Let me know! I’d love to chat and get to know you better! You can find us below in some of our favorite places to hang out. Can’t wait to chat with you about your Preschooler’s learning journey!
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