Earth and Space Science

In grade 4, we have been investigating the solar system and its origins. Our central idea is: Earth is part of a vast and mysterious solar system which we are continually striving to understand.

Our concepts have been: Form - What is it like? Function - How does it work?

Connection - How is it linked to other thing?

The solar system is incredibly large and students often have a hard time visualizing its size.

We pretended the sun was around the size of a basketball to help them understand the size of the solar system. How far apart would the planets be from one another?

Students made predictions in groups about where the planets should be placed on a paper line.

Then they calculated the actual distances using units of 10 million miles as their measurement.

They discovered that their predictions were wrong as all the groups had the outer planets much

too close to the inner planets.