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On 5/28/19 1:33 PM, Arlyn DeBruyckere wrote:
Do a scale model of the solar system.
Yup, that's a winner.
I use 0.5 au = 1 meter for distance and 5 au=1 meter for planet size
I think those scale factors are reversed, but we get the idea.
My mother did this with her elementary-school kids, on a larger scale:
1 AU = 100 meters;
1 meter = 0.01 AU
(for sizes as well as distances).
-- The earth was 8.5 mm in diameter, on the door of her classroom.
-- The sun was a beach ball at the far end of the corridor, 100 m away.
-- Jupiter was 95 mm in diameter, on a lamp-post ½ km down the road
-- Neptune was 33 mm in diameter, on a lamp-post 3 km down the road in
the other direction.
-- etc.
The kids could visit Neptune if they wanted, while on shopping
trips or whatever. Some of them walked past Jupiter every day
on their way to school.
There was some talk of setting up a telescope to observe the
outer planet models, but this was deemed too much of a hassle
in the elementary-school setting.
Gory numerical details:
https://www.av8n.com/physics/planetary-data.html
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