Planets

Amazing Space is a collection of resources designed by teachers in collaboration with scientists at the Space Telescope Institute. The resources use Hubble Space Telescope images to teach science and math concepts and skills.

This lesson plan from Read Write Think is for grades 6-8. Students listen to and discuss poetry about astronomy and write their own poems to enhance their learning of the subject.

Explore the wonderful image gallery for pictures and videos, find lesson modules on astronomy, and topics specific to elementary and high school students. Click on links; all sites are identified as English, French or bilingual.

Students can learn all about the universe we can see in infrared. Spectacular images, fun games, resources for educators, and more!

The California Academy of Sciences provides this 25 minute video, free for educational use. "Float up through Earth’s atmosphere, and gain an astronaut’s view of your home — the only planet currently known to support life. Then travel to the Moon, Mars, and even beyond the Milky Way to search for habitats that might support extraterrestrial life."

Lesson plans developed by NASA that explore information from space telescopes

A teacher resource site focused on Mars by Arizona State University

In this lesson (which has links to printouts, videos and resources), students will identify the planets in the solar system, observe and describe their characteristics and features, and build a scale model out of everyday materials.

Here's an idea for a class project. This annual contest is for students up to 12th grade. Submissions must relate to orbital settlements. Settlements must be permanent, relatively self-sufficient homes, not temporary work camps. Submissions may focus on one or a few aspects of space settlement and supporting systems.

NASA has so many resources that it is sometimes difficult to find something useful. This page has a well-organized list of video references. "This page is meant to be an overarching guide to digital video and animation related to NASA and space exploration." (site)

Scholastic has a collection of lesson plans, activities and other content to help students learn about our solar system.

This is a hands-on project to create a space colony. The lesson is designed for junior high students and is broken down into specific tasks.

Space Station Explorers collects the best space-based activities from across the web. Content can be sorted by grade, subject, and learning environment. Teachers can also search for specific subject matter (e.g., a search for "gravity" reveals five lesson options including "Ants in Space" and "Invisible Forces").

The Canadian Aviation Museum explains all the parts of an astronaut's space suit or Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU). Click on the images to learn about the different parts of an astronaut’s space suit, along with experiments and instructions for making your own EMU.