Tests and Planetariums

6th graders are taking their first astronomy test this coming Friday. It's all about the Earth, the Moon, and the Sun. The most important ideas are the causes of the tides and the phases of the moon, and being able to discuss the relationship between the two concepts. I believe this is the students' first exposure to gravity in a science setting, and we've been talking about Newton's First Law of Motion. Some of the ideas can get a little confusing, since all the forces are invisible and they interact in what I consider to be cool and exciting ways (some students may believe differently).

We've also scheduled our first planetarium visit for the 27th of January. We'll be heading over to the lower school so that Ms. Wlodarczyk can show us some more of the sites of the solar system. It should be one of the academic highlights of January. Now is a good time for students to start to generate questions that it might be easier to explain in the planetarium, and it's a great time for parents to ask "what did you learn in school today?"
A parent sent this great picture from the Hubble Space Telescope. It's of the Sombrero Galaxy - 28 million light years from Earth. It has 800 billion suns and is 50,000 light years across.