Thursday, June 9, 2011
Earth Science Activity
I teach life science and this was fun doing something with earth science for a change. For my project I found an activity on middleschoolscience.com's website that helped the students to grasp just how big our solar system is and how far some of the planets are from one another. In this activity one sheet of toilet paper(tp) represented about 18 million miles in space. The students created a large sun and did cut-outs of the eight planets the day before. The next day during first period they went outside to create their solar systems. I had the students in groups of five or six. This was a complete disaster! It was hot & humid (we live in FL) and there was a slight wind. The tp was going everywhere and everyone was miserable. We went back to my classroom and we did this as a group project- much better! A group of students went out the back door to be Uranus- you need several students to hold the layer of tp up, one to count the tp, and another to hold the roll. Another group of student went out the front door and into the courtyard to be Neptune. After my second class I got the hang of it and the next three periods were good. If I were to do this again, I would borrow the gym & I would probably use string or twine. Yes, I had a few students who turned themselves into mummies! Probably not a great activity for the end of the year but they did grasp the concept!
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That is so interesting that you picked the toilet paper solar system activity to do with your students! I just wrote about that activity for the Application that was due on a model of the solar system. I have done this lesson before and I can totally identify with the disaster of the slight wind and ripping toilet paper. :) I also live in Florida and understand that humidity plays a big part in reacting with the thin toilet paper. I was glad to read that you learned from this experience and adapted your lesson. We usually do it inside as well and it is interesting to see how far outside the classroom we eventually have to expand for Neptune! It really gives the students a clear picture of how massive our solar system really is! I don't think that there is any hands-on activity that goes as planned at the end of the year. The kids are all a little wound up. Great post and I could really identify with all that you wrote!
ReplyDeleteI just looked up next week's application five minutes ago and saw that I should have saved that for this week! Oh well! I'll find something else!
ReplyDeleteHi MJ,
ReplyDeleteI have to admit that I am not sure of the price, but I know some teachers have used cash register tape in the past with success. At least then, the likelihood of student mummies would decrease :) Amy
Amy-
ReplyDeleteGreat idea! I hadn't even thought of that!
mj
MJ,
ReplyDeleteI also read about that activity and it sounded interesting, I am sorry you had so many difficulties initially. If you had a hallway long enough and it was tiled you could also use those as markers.
-Julie