First Grade Talks About Stars!

A couple of weeks ago, we talked about stars! We looked at the Sun as a star, then talked about constellations. We started the week off with our Sun BrainPOP on Monday.

Tuesday, we talked about how the sun makes it's own light and how we can see shadows depending on where the sun is in the sky. The kids made paper plate sun dials to take home and see the different times of the day by looking at the shadows the sun makes a the Earth spins around!

Once they finished their sun dials, I poked a hole in the middle for them so they could put their popsicle sticks in the middle (but we put those in their class baggies so they didn't lose or break them). We used flashlights to show how the shadow from the popsicle stick would change directions and look like it was moving, just like the sun would!

Wednesday was the 100th day of school, so we skipped our star study and had a 100th day of school engineering day! Thursday, we were right back at our science work. We talked about constellations and how they are pictures that the stars make when you connect them. I pulled up our sky apps so we could see the different objects in the sky and find some constellations.

{Here is the post with our sky apps}

The kids paired up and walked around the room viewing the different objects in the sky and trying to find constellations and the pictures they made!

**Some of the pictures might be hard to see. We were walking around in a dark room so that our constellations would be easier to see and so it would feel like nighttime!

They found Pisces!

Virgo

The Sun

Pisces!

Friday, the kids made their own constellations. They each got a half sheet of black construction paper and 9 silver star stickers. They placed their stars where they wanted on their black paper, then connected their stars with a white crayon to show what their constellation was! They named their own constellations, too. There are some VERY creative kids in this building!

I LOVE teaching the kids about constellations! We could have looked at them with our apps for the entire week if we had time!

First Grade Goes Lunar!

Last week, the kids studied the moon! We talked about craters, phases of the moon and how it revolves around the Earth causing day and night. Monday, we watched our BrainPOP on the Moon.

Tuesday, the kids looked at how phases of the moon happen. Each group made a moon using a piece of foil and a popsicle stick. Then, they stuck it in a piece of play dough to keep it from moving, and situated a flash light (their sun) so that it would shine on one side of the moon.

Then, they used their Phases of the Moon cards to show where the different phases of the moon were all around the moon they made.

Wednesday, we looked at how craters are formed on the moon. Each table got a pan of flour (yes it was a messy day!) to act as their moon surface. They took turns picking different balls (which were our meteors) and dropped them on the the surface of the moon to see what kind of craters they would make.

The kids chose from different meteors of all sizes and weights.

Some meteors left huge craters on the moon's surface!

Other craters were small, but they went really deep into the moon's surface.

When we finished our crater lab, we talked about all of the different craters that were made on the moon's surface by the different meteors! We had, wide, narrow, deep and shallow craters. We also talked about the different patterns we say from the meteors when they hit the surface and why that happen. We learned about how scientists, like astronomers, can learn all sorts of things about meteors by the craters they make on the moon!

Thursday, we review the phases of the moon like we talked about in our BrainPOP. The kids used popsicle sticks, white play dough and black paint to make their own moons! 

They shaped their play dough into balls, then painted half of the ball black to show the dark side of the moon.

Friday, the kids colored pictures of the Sun, Moon and Earth, then put them together to show the cycle that the Earth takes around the Sun, and the Moon takes around the Earth.

We had a fun (and LONG) week learning all about the moon!