What does math have to do with the behavior of the earth and sun? Learn how the movement of celestial bodies has influenced the development of trigonometry. Scholars connects the details in mathematics to their...

Students explore the average surface temperature of planets. They use the Planet Temperature Calculator to find the average temperature. Students explore how the distance from the sun affects the Earth's average surface temperature. They...

Students view NASA images and movies of Venus, Earth, and Mars to deduce weather patterns and manipulate computer models to test competing hypotheses. They manipulate computer models to investigate the influence of solar distance and...

In this relative sizes of the sun and stars learning exercise, high schoolers determine the relative sizes of the Earth, Jupiter, the Sun and other stars. Students compare the size of stars given ratios of one star to another.

How quickly does light travel long distances? A short video simulates light going from the earth to the moon at two different paces. Scholars relate the distance to the rate to understand which simulation is correct.

Ninth graders study the sun and its distance from Earth.  In this Sun's diameter instructional activity students examine how measurement data permits accurate measurement of the sun's diameter. 

Does the space shuttle have an odometer? Maybe, but all that is needed to determine the distance to the moon is a little geometry! The lesson asks scholars to sketch the relationship of the Earth and moon using shadows of an eclipse....

High schoolers examine how Earth's rotation causes daily cycles in solar energy using a microset of satellite data to investigate the Earth's daily radiation budget and locating map locations using latitude and longitude coordinates.

Seventh-graders solve 20 various types of problems related to ratio and rate. They write ratios in simplest form for each given statement, to compare the area of two figures, and write two ratios equivalent to each ratio. Pupils express...

How do you put something as large as the universe in perspective? Use a series of scale experiments. Classmates collaborate around four experiments to examine the scale of the earth-moon system, our solar system, the Milky Way galaxy,...

Logical thinking is at the forefront of this jam-packed lesson, with young mathematicians not only investigating geometric concepts but also how they "know what they know". Through each activity and worksheet, learners wrestle with...

Young scholars study what makes Earth warm and explore how different locations on the planetreceive different amounts of solar energy based on the intensity of the sun's rays. They calculate light intensities and compare the amounts of...

Students make several models of the solar system to learn the positions of the planets in the solar system as well as relative distances and sizes. Creation of these models will help them identify the planets by size, shape, color,...

Young scientists gain a better understanding of space, the solar system and its vastness by creating a scale model. Students first need to calculate the distance between each of the nine planets according to the size of their scale. This...

Students build a solar oven. In this Science lesson, students construct a functional solar oven. Students design the oven and explain the energy concepts involved.

Students determine how to find North using a watch and their shadow. In this finding North lesson, students go outside on a sunny day and work with their shadow and a wrist watch to find out which direction that North is. They examine...

In this images of the sun worksheet, high schoolers read about the images released by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory and they solve 3 problems using the given photograph of the sun. Students find the scale of the image, they compare...

In this solar storms activity, students read about the correlation between different astronomical events to find patters and new 'laws' of nature. Students use given statistical information about solar flares and coronal mass ejections...

In this pulsars worksheet, students read about the spin rate of pulsars and they are given two equations that predict the spin rate in the future of these two pulsars. Students solve 6 problems related to the given equations and...

Students compare Jupiter and Earth. In this Earth and space studies lesson, students compare the composition of Earth and Jupiter and analyze how the composition affects the rate at which the planets spin.

Students investigate methods of estimating through cooperative group activities, hands-on activities, the use of tables and graphs and an interactive video.

Students investigate how all links in the food chain are related. In this animal habitat lesson, students hypothesize about what would happen in the food chain if an endangered species were to become extinct. This lesson also includes an...

For this math worksheet, students read informational paragraphs and then answer 18 questions using data from their readings. Questions are about vectors, positions, distance and orbits.

In this sunspots worksheet, students use the given size of a sunspot and find the total number of Earth's it would take to equal the sunspot size. Students answer 3 questions about the sunspots and are given an extra credit problem with...