We have blasted off into outer space!

We have been looking upward, into the heavens, and learning about this glorious universe that God has created for us.

This unit is basically for my primary level kids. Mark-8 and Grace-6.

I have posted some of the things we are doing and have done, but I am also looking for you folks to offer any suggestions you might have to enhance our study.

We are all really enjoying this one!

We have been reading factual books to start our study off--learning the basic facts of astronomy. A few weeks ago I purchased this game and after just a little study into our space unit, I am very pleased that both little kids have fun, and success playing this game. It is the perfect learning level for my kindergarter and second grader. It also leads to more exploration as we play the game and learn new facts.

I bought this mobile kit. I haven't opened it yet, since I will use it for our "grand finale" project. Hopefully, it won't be too hard, and the kids themselves will be able to acheive nice results.
Here are a few of our "fact" books that we have been using. I have a couple more requested from my local library such as First Space Encyclopedia-a DK book. Of course, we have also been using a lot of resources from the internet, especially Enchanted Learning, from which I have found a lot of elements for our lapbook.
I have also been having fun searching for space related fiction picture books. If you know of any, please leave a comment. These are so fun. We have been learning to pick out fact from fiction, and been learning about how fun it is to use our imaginations. I want the kids to try and write a outer space story together next week.

And now, the beginnings of Our Space Lapbook.

Many of the elements that we have included in our lapbook came from the website, Space Lapbook on Squidoo. If the ideas didn't come directly from this site, they came from links that were included on this site.

We did make an accordian fold booklet about the phases of the moon. I copied pictures out of the book The Moon to use for this element.

One of the things that everyone enjoyed was finding out what they would weigh on other planets. I found this at Enchanted Learning's Zoom Astonomy ( a wonderful resource.)

The moon phases flip book has also been a big hit. I found it at this site.

I still have more ideas for this lapbook. One important element is the Homeschool share unit about the book Maria's Comet. I am still waiting for this book to arrive from the library.

I am also looking for suggestions as to what else to include in this study. I would love to hear some comments.