Goodnight Moon is a favorite story for many toddlers. We love the book so much, that we decided to make a sensory bin to go along with it! We are going through the letter ‘M’ with my preschooler, and one of our activities is to read Goodnight Moon 
This bin really has material that goes along with the book. In the bin I added the following:
*black beans
*shiny stars (beads from Michaels)
*yellow pompoms (to represent moon)
*3 bears on chairs
*kitten
*mouse
*cow and the moon
*clock (I painted a wooden circle white, then added the clock face)
*corner for mittens and socks (hung on pipe cleaner with small clothespins. Mittens and socks are cut from foam)
*picture of a comb
*bowl and spoon (for mush)
Each of these items go along with what’s in the book. There were more things I could have added to this bin that are in the book, but I could not find around my house or at the store. For example, I would have loved to add a bed with a rabbit, but couldn’t find a small rabbit anywhere. Oh well, it doesn’t have to be perfect! 🙂
When I presented this bin to my toddler, I read the story aloud to him. While I read it, we pointed out things in the story that we had in the bin. For example, here are the 3 bears on chairs.
We also practiced clipping on the mittens and socks to the clothespins (with help from mom!). This is good practice for fine motor skills, but your child may need assistance with this!
And we scooped “mush” into our bowl.
And of course, I gave him plenty of time to just explore and use imaginary play. His absolute FAVORITE thing to do was say “the cow jumped over the moon” and then show me with his cow and moon.
This bin was tons of fun! I loved it because it helped him practice listening skills, comprehension skills, and fostered imaginary play.
After the bin, we made our own moon with craters. To do this, I mixed yellow paint with a small handful of flour. Then we painted a circle moon onto black paper. Here is my almost 4 year old painting his moon. I painted the circle for my 2 year old. After the moon was painted, we took a bottle cap and stamped it all around to make craters!
Here’s the final product!
Hope you enjoyed taking a peek at our Goodnight Moon activities! Do you have a fun activity to share that goes along with this book?
I absolutely love this idea and so many other ideas on here!!! I could spend hours on your website searching for activities for our 18 month old. You have truly inspired me!
Thank you!! That means a lot!
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What an awesome sensory bin … so much fun! And I love the activities in it for developing fine-motor skills. Thanks so much for sharing my Goodnight Moon roundup. I just added your sensory bin to my Goodnight Moon post. 🙂
Deb @ Living Montessori Now recently posted…30+ Apple Sensory Tubs
L♡VE this!! Its got to be one of — if not the — coolest sensory bins I’ve ever seen! Oh, I’m so going to find or make the items from the book…guess a picture of me will gave to pass for the
“old lady who was whispering ‘Hush.’ ”
Thanks for sharing this sweet, charming idea!
Oh you just made my day! Thank you!! You are so kind. We had a lot of fun with this bin!
This is one of the coolest sensory bins I have ever seen. I loved that you added all of the things from the book. That makes it fun to read the book before playing with the sensory bin or even WHILE playing with the sensory bin. I’ll definitely have to do this with my kiddos.
Kirstylee recently posted…Activity Pack Giveaway (Plus Do-a-Dot Markers and Pattern Blocks)
You are so sweet! Thank you! We had a lot of fun with this.
We love goodnight moon. What an awesome and thoughtful bin! Love for you to share it today and also my latest book and bin is a linky too! Love to see you there!
Sarah recently posted…Ultimate Sensory Pin Party #7
Oh my goodness – this is awesome! We are so into Goodnight Moon right now, and my son would LOVE this. Now if I can just get all the stuff together to put this together for him! 🙂