Classroom games with planets

During its heyday, the space shuttle was the most sophisticated spaceship around. Help kids learn about it by building little models from cardboard tubes. Learn more: A Little Pinch of Perfect. Snack on the solar system as you learn! This activity combines a healthy snack with space fun. Learn more: Me and B Make Tea. How pretty is this little constellations luminary?

Get the free printable and learn how to put it together at the link. Learn more: Red Ted Art. Round up some old crayons and use their shavings to make pretty planet sun catchers to bright up your windows.

Learn more: Pre-K Pages. This quick demo is a good way to introduce the concept of orbits to little learners, using a pie plate, some playdough, and a ball or marble. She has a degree in Secondary English Education and has taught in middle and high school classrooms. She's also done training and curriculum design for a financial institution and been a science museum educator.

She currently lives in Tampa, Florida where she often works on her back porch while taking frequent breaks for bird-watching and gardening. You must be logged in to post a comment. Learn more: And Next Comes L. This hands-on constellation activity does require you to buy some geoboards, but these are such a valuable tool for the classroom that you'll find yourself using them in various ways. Learn more: School Time Snippets.

No matter the age, students love learning about space. Teach math skills when talking about science as these pattern block mats are perfect for teaching geometry. It's a simple activity with minimal setup.

A measurement activity that is relatively quick and simple, but it is a fantastic way to get your students to think about the different ways that people can measure things.

For example, how many suns long is my foot? Learn more: Tot schooling. These printables have a bit of moon and a few of your favorite planets, and you can use them for various educational scenarios.

As a kid, who did not love a good cootie catcher? Learn more: Rock Your Homeschool. This moon phase craft is great for hands-on learning. Make them the size of your palm for a handful of the moon in your room.

Not to mention, the kids can use them as a night light. Learn more: Rainy Day Mum. Should they choose to accept it, your students' mission is to create aliens and space ships and tell a story using their puppets.

We recommend using pompoms for asteroids and pictures of planets. Learn more: The Inspirational Edit. Take your students on a trip to the mars with this brilliant activity. They'll learn about the surface of Mars and its size compared to earth.

Kinesthetic learners will like all of the new feelings they experience. Learn more: Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers. A pinwheel galaxy is perfect for teaching the orbit of the sun. Students will be able to make their solar system move as they please. How long would a day be in their solar system? Learn more: Books and Giggles. Looking for something a little more simplistic and easy to set up? Try these printable space challenge cards, courtesy of Lego, that will get your students familiar with some key space terminology.

Learn more: Little Bins Bricks. Enable your students to visualize the enormity of space by creating a scale model of our solar system. You may need to explain the concept of a scale model. For your model, one step will equal 36 million miles!

The teacher should play the role of the Sun. Give each student or group of students a planet, and instruct them to take a certain number of steps away from you, representing the true distance of that planet from the Sun.

For example, the student representing Neptune should take 78 steps away from you. The child holding the Uranus model will take 50 steps in the same direction as Neptune. Continuing to follow the same path, Saturn will take 25 steps, Jupiter will take 13, Mars will take 4 steps, Earth will take 3 steps, Venus will take 2, and, finally, Mercury will take only 1 step.

The McDonald Observatory at the University of Texas at Austin features an activity to help students in grades K-5 understand the objects they see in the night sky with this activity that features constellations. Using the printable provided in the pdf file on the McDonald Observatory site or creating your own for the constellations of the zodiac, students will explore the night sky and understand why the constellations are not always visible or always in the same location in the sky.

Give one of the figures to each of 13 students. Choose two other students to represent the sun and the Earth. The student representing the Earth will walk around the sun in one revolution which you may want to remind students takes days.

Prepare a set of index cards featuring key solar system terms. Include terms such as meteorite, asteroid, asteroid belt, planet, dwarf planet, and all of the names of the planets in the solar system.

Pass out one card to each student and instruct the students to hold their card on their forehead, with the term facing outward. No one should look at his or her own card!

Next, invite students to mingle around the room and ask each other questions about themselves, such as, "Does anything orbit around me?

To demonstrate this, The Lunar and Planetary Institute highlights an activity that uses fruits and vegetables to illustrate the size of the sun and each of the eight planets to help children in grades comprehend the relative size of the planets and other objects that orbit the sun. Use a giant pumpkin to represent the sun. Then, use fruits such as mangoes, oranges, cantaloupes, plums, limes, grape, and blueberries to represent each planet. Peas, beans, or grains of rice or pasta can be used to represent the smallest celestial bodies.

To help young children learn the planets in their order from the sun, play Planet Toss. Play Solar System Switch-a-Roo! Try to find Mars! Something Something Something. If you liked this, you may like: Write your own zany adventure story! What Is a Meteor Shower?