Sizing up the Solar System
Objective:
Research, collect and organize data pertaining to the sizes of the nine
planets and their distances from the Sun. This lesson integrated both math
and science.
Day 1: Students were paired up and assigned a planet
for research. The first part of the research took place in the computer lab
and consisted in gathering data over the Internet that included the sizes
and distances of the planets in kilometers.
Day 2: Students continued their research on the
Internet as well as textbooks and library material. They then compiled their
numerical data into two class charts.
Day 3: The students developed two basic charts in
Excel: one for the sizes and another one for the distances. They copied
images of the Solar System from the Internet and set them as backgrounds on
the worksheets.
Day 4: The students ended the project by composing a
class workbook on Excel consisting of 4 worksheets and 6 charts, each on a
separate sheet. Half of these were done in Spanish and the other half in
English. Each child contributed throughout the different phases of the
workbook by adding features such as WordArt, ClipArt and headers, inserting
comment boxes, copying and rearranging worksheets, resizing columns, etc.
Click on image above for sample spreadsheet.
