Download It`s a bird, it`s a plane…

It’s a bird, it’s a plane…
“Other stuff in the sky”
Planets
• Large bodies that orbit the stars or remnants of a
star
• Our solar system has 8 (+ Pluto and Charon)
• Venus, Mars and Jupiter are all visible from
earth at different times with the naked eye
Planets vs.
Dwarf Planets
• Dwarf planets (like Pluto)
exist in the far reaches of
our solar system
• Planets must be round,
orbit the sun, and not be
close to objects of similar
mass
• Pluto’s moon, Charon, is
almost the same size,
which disqualifies Pluto
from Planethood
Moons
• Large bodies that
orbit the planets,
sometimes called
natural satellites
• The most familiar is
earth’s solitary
moon, but the gas
giants can have
several each
Ellipse
Asteroids
• Asteroids are large chunks of metal and rock
that are difficult to see with the eye
• They do not form tails
• They have elliptical orbits
• Most orbit the sun in an area known as the
asteroid belt (between Mars and Jupiter) in
the same direction as the planets
• They produce meteors when they enter the
atmosphere
Meteors
• A meteor is the visible event when a lump
of rock enters the earths atmosphere
– Meteoroids just enter the atmosphere, burning
up before they reach the surface
– Meteorites are large enough that they strike
the surface
• The burn-up is caused by friction with the
air. They’re also known as shooting stars.
Comets
• Comets are made up of ice and dust
• They form tails when they pass through
the inner solar system
• They orbit the sun in large ellipses, and
can go in the same or different directions
as the planets.
• They usually remain in the outermost
regions of the solar system.
Galaxies
• A gravitationally bound system of stars,
planets, dust and dark matter
• They come in different shapes. The most
common of these
are spiral galaxies
and elliptical galaxies.