Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Our Solar System


Wow! Today we asked our students to draw a picture of our solar system before we began our new unit. In their picture they should have included anything they knew about the system around us. We were expecting that a fair amount of students would be able to list the planets in order, understanding the sun was in the center. Maybe a few would know the planets were not all the same size and have some idea of their characteristics. Boy, did we underestimate their knowledge. Here is a list of responses we recieved:



  • Saturn and Neptune have rings

  • Saturn's rings go around its equator while Neptune's go around its poles

  • Pluto is a dwarf planet

  • We have 4 inner and 4 or 5 outer planets

  • An asteroid belt serparates the inner and outer planets

  • Jupiter is the largest planet

  • Jupiter's volume is large enough to fit all the other planets inside

  • We live in the Milky Way Galaxy

  • Pluto is in or near the Kuiper Belt

  • Our moon causes our tides

  • Planets revole and rotate

  • Mercury has a very hot side and a very cold side

  • Jupiter is a gas giant


I think we will need to revise our lessons!

5 comments:

Suzanne said...

Your kids know more than I do! Yikes. Perhaps, I need to sit in on your science classes. :)

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Anonymous said...

i thought the brochere was fun.




-Min #9

Anonymous said...

I really did'nt know that every single person on earth lived in the milkly galaxy.lovekiala