Our Solar System

For science this week we studied our solar system. Did I tell you we do science twice a week? (Well we're SUPPOSED to, and this week we did.) Well, I figured that since I was in Vanuatu for half this semester and who knows about next semester, we need to do double duty to get through the content.

The first lesson we talked mostly about planets' rotation around the sun and how gravity and the laws of physics (mostly inertia and centripetal force) effect all that. We also talked more about the sun.

As part of this we talked about how a spinning planet works like a gyroscope and gives it stability.

Friday's lesson (which I moved an hour later because I was late getting back from Lethbridge...I love the moms who are so easy going with me!) We talked a little more about the entire solar system, but then focused on the inner rocky planets. We'll need to talk more about Mars because we didn't get to some things.

And by the way, those books that were "lost" in the mail ended up being at Babb after all! So now I am definitely ready for teaching!

Constellations

We also had the FIRST science club in this house!!! We focused mostly on constellations. I thought we had some pretty magical moments. We went into my dark storage area and brought out Maxwell's constellation globe. They passed it around while I read greek myths about the constellations.

They also made their own constellations and we talked about how constellations are completely dependent on your viewing perspective. The kids had a good question: How far away from earth would you need to be before the constellations don't look familiar? I have no idea. Good science fair question.

Inro to the Universe

Thursday and Friday we're SUPPOSED to do science, but I've only done two classes so far.

The first class was an introductory to astronomy. We talked a bit about how to study stars, including how to find the North Star. We also spent quite a bit of time talking about telescopes and how they work. This of course brought up light and lenses and all that Jazz.

The other class we had, we learned about the expansion of the universe and red shift. We talked about why the milky-way looks hazy, why stars twinkle, and what makes a star bright.

We also talked about the movement of the stars in the sky, and used an umbrella globe to illustrated this:

but that's all the classes we've done because, well, MOSTLY because I couldn't get my science book! I was SO annoyed. I ordered all the books I needed to do science. I got two of them, but one got lost in the mail. I went ahead anyway, but then after two lessons I felt stuck. I ordered ANOTHER one of the same book. THAT ONE got delayed in the mail too! (still not here)

Finally our house closed and we moved all our stuff in the garage. The highlight of the move for me was to open a school box and find THIS:

Science is up and in full force now folks (ummmm except I'm gone to Calgary this Friday picking Dustin up from the airport......)