Download Lesson Plan: Size and Distance: It`s All Relative

RainesKR
Spring 2008
Size and Distance: It’s All Relative
Standards
National Science Education Standards
Lesson 1- 90 minutes
Science as Inquiry


“Think critically and logically to make the relationships between
evidence and explanations.”
“Thinking critically about evidence includes deciding what evidence
should be used and accounting for anomalous data. Specifically,
students should be able to review data from a simple experiment,
summarize the data, and form a logical argument about the cause-andeffect relationships in the experiment. Students should begin to state
some explanations in terms of the relationship between two or more
variables.”
Earth in the Solar System


Most objects in the solar system are in regular and predictable motion.
Those motions explain such phenomena as the day, the year, phases of
the moon, and eclipses.
Gravity is the force that keeps planets in orbit around the sun and
governs the rest of the motion in the solar system. Gravity alone holds
us to the Earth’s surface and explains the phenomena of the tides.
Virginia Standards Of Learning
6.8 The student will investigate and understand the organization of the solar
system and the relationship among the various bodies that comprise it. Key
concepts include:
a) the sun, moon, Earth, other planets, and their moons, meteors,
asteroids, and comets;
b) relative size of and distance between planets;
d) revolution and rotation.
Lesson Plan Outline
Topic
Instructional Objectives
This lesson is the introductory lesson for the unit and is therefore
going to be used to introduce or re-introduce students to the solar
system depending on the prior knowledge of the students. Most of
the students will have already learned something about the planets
so using the scale model of the solar system will hopefully refresh
their prior knowledge while expanding upon that knowledge. This
lesson was created to teach students about the relative size and
distance between the eight planets of the solar system.
Students will be able to
Understand:
 The solar system is a complex arrangement and there are a
number of different elements that comprise it.
 A planet’s distance from the sun effects the time it takes for the
given planet to rotate around the sun.
 A planet’s relative size plays a role in the key characteristics
that separate that planet from the other planets.
Know:
 The definition of a planet has three parts:
1. The object must have enough force to pull itself in a
spherical shape.
RainesKR
Spring 2008





2. The object must orbit a star.
3. The object must have its own clear path around the
sun.
Pluto is no longer a planet because it fails the part of the
definition of a planet in that it doesn’t have its own clear path
around the sun.
The order of the planets going away from the sun is Mercury,
Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.
The first four planets, Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars, are
known as the terrestrial planets because they have rocky
surfaces.
The outer four planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune,
are known as the gas giants because they are comprised of
gases and do not have solid surfaces.
The further away a planet is from the sun, the longer time it
will take the planet to revolve around the sun because the
planet has a longer orbit.
Do:
 The students will describe the eight planets and their relative
size and position from the sun. Comprehension.
 The students will be able to design and interpret a scale model
of the solar system. Synthesis and analysis.
 The students will be able to apply their understanding gained
from the scale model to formulate a definition for the word
“revolution” through both a sketch and a written response.
Application and comprehension.
Materials & Resources
-Computer access for all students
-Index card labels for each planet: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars,
Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.
-1 basketball
-1 soccer ball
-2 baseballs
-2 tennis balls
-2 ping pong balls
-2 golf balls
-2 marbles
-2 bb bullets
-2 grains of sand
-Access to an 80 foot field (ideally a circular area with a diameter of
160 feet)
-Video camera (optional)
-PortaPortal (optional)
-SmartBoard (optional)
-Student will need their science notebooks for the engage and
explain portions of the lesson.
Engage
To engage the students in learning about the solar system and
its components the teacher will start the introductory lesson by
having students brainstorm about definitions for a planet. The
teacher will start by showing the students a piece of paper. The
teacher will ask, “What makes this thing that I’m holding a piece of
paper?” As students share responses such as “It’s white” or “It’s a
RainesKR
Spring 2008
rectangle” the teacher will play devil’s advocate and respond by
saying “Oh so all paper is white” or “Is all paper a rectangle?”
These types of responses will hopefully show students the need to
be specific when creating a definition.
Next, the teacher will ask “What parameters would you give for
a planet? What rules does a space object have to abide by in order
to be considered a planet?” Students will brainstorm in their science
notebooks and come up with a definition of a planet. After a few
minutes the students will share their responses. Again the teacher
will stress the need to be specific and inclusive of what is currently
considered a planet. Students will share their responses.
The students will then go to the internet and find scientific
definitions of the word “planet” and will do some comparisons of
their answers to the scientific definitions they have found. Students
will then share the actual definition of a planet, and the teacher will
clarify any misconceptions.
The teacher will close this activity by explaining the difficulties
that come with creating definitions and how scientists have also
been struggling with the definition of a planet over the past few
years.
Explore
Next, students will explore the relative size of the solar system
by creating a scale model. The teacher will give eight students
‘planets.’ One student will need a basketball, one a soccer ball, two
will need tennis balls, two baseballs, and two will need ping pong
balls. The teacher will give eight different students the index cards
with the labels for the eight planets on them, Mercury, Venus,
Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. The teacher will
tell the students to work as a class to pair up the correct label with
each of the planets. Once the students think they have paired
everything up correctly the teacher will tell them how many
matches they have correct but will not tell them specifically which
pairs. Students will then have a chance to rethink their answers.
The teacher will recheck, and the students will fix any mismatches.
This pattern will continue until all 8 planets are labeled correctly.
The correct answers are as follows:
Mercury, ping pong ball
Venus, tennis ball
Earth, tennis ball
Mars, ping pong ball
Jupiter, basketball
Saturn, soccer ball
Uranus, baseball
Neptune, baseball
Students will continue to explore the vastness of the solar
system by creating a scale model of the distance between the
planets of the solar system. For this portion of the lesson the
teacher will need to exchange the sports balls above for smaller
representations. This is so that the size of the planets is kept the
same proportion as the distance between them. The teacher will
then take the students to the field where they will be able to spread
really far apart. (If the teacher is able to and wants to he or she
RainesKR
Spring 2008
may choose to prepare the field prior to having the students go
outside. To do this they will mark off with spray paint or cones the
distance from the sun of each planet.) The students will then take
the planet they are holding to it’s respective orbit. The distances
from the sun are given below:
Sun, basketball, 0 feet (beginning)
Mercury, grain of sand, 1 foot away
Venus, BB bullet, 1 foot 10 inches away
Earth, BB bullet, 2 feet 8 inches away
Mars, grain of sand, 3 feet 10 inches away
Jupiter, golf ball, 13 feet 3 inches away
Saturn, ping pong ball, 24 feet 3 inches away
Uranus, marble, 48 feet 8 inches away
Neptune, marble, 76 feet 4 inches away
While the students are spread almost 80 feet apart the teacher
will ask the students to start walking around their orbit around the
sun. This will help the students to understand that the further a
planet is from the sun, the longer the revolution that planet has.
The teacher may choose to video tape this portion of the lesson so
that the students can later watch it and see everything at oncewhich is often hard if the students are being a part of the larger
picture.
Explain
As the students return to the classroom, the teacher will give the
students time to think about the activity they just completed. The
teacher will show the students the video of the scale model so that
they can see the big picture and then use their new understandings
to explain the purpose of the scale model and what they have
learned. Students will use their science notebooks to put into words
what they experienced and what understandings about the relative
size of the solar system and the relationship between a planets
distance from the sun and its time for one revolution.
Extend
To further show students the “length of a revolution” the teacher
can connect this portion of the lesson to math, talking about
circumference of circles. The teacher may have students calculate
the circumference of the orbit for each planet and then cut a string
the length of each circumference. This may help the students to
further see the drastic difference in distance for a revolution
between Mercury and Neptune.
Evaluate
As closure for this lesson, the teacher will use a 3-2-1 exit card.
The teacher will ask students for 3 things they learned, 2 things
they are confused about, and 1 sketch to summarize the scale
model activity. This type of evaluation will help the teacher to see
what the students gained from the scale model and what
misunderstandings or confusions they may still have. Using a
sketch or diagram as part of this will help the students to visually
represent their understanding, which may benefit the teacher see
what the students learned regardless of whether they are able to
put their understandings into words or not.
RainesKR
Spring 2008
Plans for Diversity
This lesson has been adapted to middle school students in a
number of ways. First and foremost, middle school learners are full
of energy and bring a ton of excitement to the classroom. Students
this age love the opportunity to be out of their chairs moving
around and interacting with their peers. This lesson adapts to these
general needs through hands on and minds on full class models
and physical representations of the solar system.
Middle school students have an attention span of about 7 to 12
minutes. To keep students interested and engaged in the topic,
most parts of this lesson are about 10-15 minutes in length. The
teacher will also keep students interested by using sports balls and
going outside will be a great way to keep students. Also, posing a
number of questions and allowing plenty of time for students to
pair and share the responses with partners, small groups, and the
class as a whole will help the students to stay connected to the big
ideas and material at hand. This will also help students with
Attention Deficit Disorder and Hyperactivity.
Secondly, for students who have little proficiency with the English
language, the teacher uses people models and hands on activities
rather than reading from a text. I think that students in this
category will also greatly benefit from the video because they will
have had multiple times to watch and understand major concepts
and make connections.
The teacher would do anything else that would be necessary for
adaptation, whether it be a note taking guide or the use of
additional space or time. It is hard to guess as to what needs
students might have since I do not have my own classroom at this
time.
Connections
One of the key concepts throughout science content is the idea
of “relationships” and how each element in the relationship affects
the other elements. If the teacher chooses, he or she may focus on
relationships throughout the entire course, using this as the means
to connect this lesson to other topics in science.
Another key concept is the idea of “systems.” The solar system is
a great example of how important structure and arrangement are
to the greater understanding of how the world around us works.
I am a firm believer in connections and creating a coherent
relationship between various topics. By using underlying themes of
systems and relationships the teacher will be able to link this
lesson/unit to other taught throughout a science course.
Reflections
I taught this lesson in my current 6th grade practicum placement.
Overall I think it went really well and that the students learned a
lot. The students seemed to really enjoy the hands on element of
this lesson and were actively engaged throughout each part.
I taught this lesson to three different groups of students and
learned a couple of things throughout the day. The first time I
taught this lesson, the students needed a lot of guidance and the
whole idea of “constructive” teaching did not seem to work very
well. However as I became more comfortable with the students and
the material I found ways to ask questions and time things
correctly so that students were guiding the lesson and constructing
RainesKR
Spring 2008
their own understandings. For example, with the first group of
students I didn’t let them work through the pairing of the planets
with their relative sizes long enough. I pulled the correct planets to
the top of the classroom, and then when there was only two
planets left (that were wrong) and so the students knew just to flip
flop the two. With the later classes, I only pulled one of the correct
pairings to the front of the room, and told the students how many
pairings were wrong, which forced the students to work together
and use their critical thinking skills to rearrange the planets. This
method made students think through the process rather than
depend on luck!
The second thing I want to comment on was the usefulness of
the video recording. When the students came back to the
classroom and we were able to watch the video while I posed
questions the students were able to focus- not distracted by being
outside or walking around the orbit. As mentioned above, this was
also helpful because students could see the big picture and not just
what was going on with their own task. Along with the video, we
showed it to the students on the smart board. This was really good
because we could pause the video and trace the path of the planet
or record along the side of the board the number of revolutions for
each planet. Technology is an amazing resource for teachers and it
was awesome to have it to use as a way to increase the
effectiveness of my lesson.
Thank you Dr. Slykhuis for your help in making this lesson
student-centered and constructive- it really helped me present the
material in a meaningful way and see the benefits of using models
and minds on activities!