Materials Needed:
- Black construction paper
- Yellow and white crayons (or paint)
- Glitter (optional)
- Glue (if using glitter)
- A flashlight
- A dark or dimly lit room
- Pictures or simple drawings of the Sun, Earth, Moon, and a few other planets (like Mars and Jupiter)
Lesson Activities:
Hello, Space Explorer!
Hi there! Have you ever looked up at the sky at night? What did you see? (Wait for response - stars, maybe the moon). Today, we're going on an amazing adventure to learn about the huge, wonderful place called the Universe! Our Earth is just a tiny part of it.
Our Place in Space
We live on a planet called Earth. It's like a giant ball floating in space! But we aren't alone out here. Let's see what else is nearby.
Meet the Sun: (Go to a dark or dim room). Look at this flashlight. Let's pretend it's the Sun! (Turn on the flashlight). The Sun is actually a STAR! It's the closest star to Earth, and it's super bright and hot. It gives us light during the day and helps keep us warm. All the planets in our neighborhood, including Earth, travel around the Sun.
Our Neighbors, the Planets: Earth has neighbors called planets. They also go around the Sun. Let's look at some pictures (or drawings): Here's Earth, our home. Here's Mars, sometimes called the Red Planet. And here's giant Jupiter! There are other planets too, like Venus and Saturn. They are all part of our solar system family.
Moon Watch: We also have a Moon! Our Moon goes around the Earth. Sometimes you can see it during the day, and sometimes at night. It doesn't make its own light; it reflects light from the Sun, just like a mirror!
Sparkly Star Art
Let's make our own night sky!
- Take your black paper. This is the dark space.
- Use your white or yellow crayon to draw lots of tiny dots and small star shapes. These are the stars! Remember, stars are like our Sun, but they are SO far away they look tiny.
- Draw one big yellow circle for the Sun (even though we see it in the daytime sky, it's still out there!).
- Draw a blue and green circle for Earth traveling around the Sun.
- If you want, draw a few other circles for planets like Mars (red) or Jupiter (orange/brown).
- Optional: Add some glue and glitter to make your stars extra sparkly!
Adventure Wrap-Up!
Wow, look at your amazing universe picture! Today we learned that we live on Planet Earth, which travels around our star, the Sun. We saw that there are other planets too, and lots and lots of faraway stars in the giant Universe. Isn't space amazing? Maybe tonight, you can look out the window and find some real stars!