Preschool: "Moon Shoes"

"As time passed, the moon became a planet-sized playground for the boy. There was so little gravity that with one hop he could bounce over the tallest mountain."

- William Joyce, Man in the Moon

For our preschool curriculum, we're doing our own personal rendition of Five in a Row (FIAR). Rather than follow all the books that they suggest & using their lesson plans, I'm choosing my own books (w/ some suggested in their curriculum) & planning little activities or lessons to go along with them. I figure if this works out okay this year, maybe I'll be ready to tackle the actual FIAR program next year when Will turns five. As of now, we're just dipping our toes in.

This week for preschool, we are reading the book Man in the Moon by William Joyce. Yesterday, we read through the book in detail, looking at the wonderful illustrations of lunar moths, glowworms, flying starfish, & the Man in the Moon (MiM). 

Today, our focus was on gravity & the ability to bounce across the moon. I grabbed some new sponges & rubber banded them to Will's feet. He then spent a good thirty minutes bouncing with his "super-really-awesome" moon shoes. 

Tomorrow, we plan to go see Rise of the Guardians to go along with this first installment of the Guardians of Childhood series. Then maybe I can convince Scott to take us to Snotopia to get some "lunar ice cream" (Hawaiian shaved ice).

Thursday & Friday, I'm hoping to talk about lunar phases of the moon (using Oreos to demonstrate the different phases) & go to the Planetarium in Sacramento. We'll then top off the week by visiting Santa Claus (one of the Guardians) on Saturday morning.

Ruby got in some learning time of her own:




And of course if you're going to take a trip to the moon, you need to wear a space helmet! (Will & Ruby were both supervised the whole time they wore the "helmet.")