PWC 6.5.1
SOL 6.10  The student will investigate and understand the organization of the solar system.  Key concepts include: 

    *   the sun, moon, Earth and other planets and their moons; meteors; asteroids,
         comets and 
    *   relative size of and distance between planets.
 

Critical Attributes:

Our solar system consists of nine planets of very different size, composition, and surface features that move around the sun in nearly circular orbits.  Some planets have great variety of moons and even flat rings of rock and ice particles orbiting around them.  Some of these planets show evidence of geological activity.

The nine planets of our solar system in order from the sun include Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto.

The planets basically come in two different types.  The Earth like, or "terrestrial," planets----Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars----are small, dense. rocky worlds.  They all have solid surfaces and are located in the inner part of the solar system.  Unlike the terrestrial planets, the Jovian or "gas" planets in the outer solar system have no solid surface.  They are circled by rings of icy particles that astronomers believe came from collisions involving their moons, captured by the giant planets' gravity.

Not all of astronomy is as regular and cyclic as the daily turnings of the Sun and the stars, or the monthly cycle of the Moon.  There are large numbers of chunks of rocks that are "leftovers" from the formation of the solar system orbiting the sun.  Some of them meet the Earth in its yearly orbit around the sun and glow and disintegrate as they plunge through the atmosphere.  Still others mixed with ice have long, off center orbits that carry them close to the Sun where the Sun's radiation boils off some of the ice as a long illuminated tail.  These chunks of rock leftovers are meteors, asteroids, and comets.

Our everyday experiences with distance don't prepare us to think about the distances and sizes of planets, stars, galaxies, and the universe as a whole.  Astronomers use a shorthand involving the fastest speed possible-the speed of light-to describe these enormous distances between objects in the universe.  Astronomers speak of distances in terms of how long it would take light to travel them.  Light moves at 18,000 miles a second and can circle the Earth 7 1/2 times in one second.  We usually refer to distances between and among planets in terms of light years to reflect the magnitude of the distance between them.
 
 

Grade Level/Subject:   Grade 6  Science
Strand: Earth and Space Science

PWC 6.5.2
SOL 6.10  The student will investigate and understand the relationships among the Earth, Moon and Sun.  Key concepts include.

     *  the role of gravity;
     *  revolution and rotation;
     *  the mechanics of day/night and phases of the Moon; 
     *  the relationships of the Earth's tilt and seasons;
     *  the causes of tides. 
 

Critical Attributes:

Gravity is the force that causes all objects within the solar system to orbit around the sun.  The Earth has its own gravitational field that keeps the Moon orbiting around it as well as around the sun.

Together, revolutions and tilt of the planets, including Earth, allow seasons to occur.  The tilt of the Earth causes some parts of the Earth to get more direct light rays from the sun.  During half of the year, the Northern Hemisphere has longer days and receives more of the sun's direct light because of its tilt toward the sun.  As the Earth revolves around the Sun, the orientation of the axis remains the same and the Southern Hemisphere gets more direct sunlight.

Rotation is the turning of a planet on its axis, which causes night and day.

The moon's phases are the changing shapes of reflected light during the moon's monthly revolution.

Tides, the rise and fall of the ocean waters, are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun.  This pull causes the water to draw up (high tide) on the side of the Earth facing the moon and on the opposite side.  The areas between those two points experience low tide.  As the Earth rotates, locations of the Earth experience different tides.
 

Grade Level/Subject:   Grade 6  Science
Strand: Earth and Space Science

PWC 6.5.3
SOL 6.10  The student will investigate and understand the history and resulting technology of space exploration.
 

Critical Attributes:

Space technology is continuously advancing and changing to meet the human desire to explore the universe.   History of exploration includes rockets, unmanned space flight, manned space flight, space probes, space shuttle missions and space stations.
 
 
 

Space technology has improved our everyday lives through the development of weather forecasting, satellite communication for television and telephone, prospecting for energy resources, medical technology, and space spin-offs.