Tag Archives: Solar system

Understanding the incomprehensible?

How do teachers create a lesson based upon the solar system and the planets positions when as an adult I cannot fully understand the true distance between planet earth and venus?

Its simple really!

As dicsussed in a previous post about my fear of mathematics I mentioned that it was very relevent to engage the learners from the beginning of a lesson, by making it relevent and relatable to their lives. So in regards to the solar system the concept of distance between planets can easily scaled down to a more digestable size.

 

image

 

Here we have a football pitch which would be a create a great interactive lesson outdoors where every child could be alocated a planet. The pupils could all messure the distance between eachother to see the scaled version of distances between planets. This lesson would not only be releven but it would also be cross curricular and create links between mathematics and science. This lesson could also be recreated using a local map where the children can see exactly how far each planet is from each other in a relevent enviviroment. The options are endless just like the universe!