The Universe: An Introduction from Smithsonian Education provides astronomy lesson plans, class activities, and a profile on astronomer Lisa Kaltenegger, who is in the burgeoning business of “planet hunting”—the discovery of planets outside of our solar system. As part of the activities, an online interactive game is available.

In Lesson 1, the class works together to arrange pictures from space according to the students’ best ideas of size, distance, and age. This active introduction to the cosmos can be a pre-assessment for a unit on space science. Lesson 2 is a modeling exercise in which relationships in space are brought down to a scale of two inches. Both lessons are based on educational materials created by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, in cooperation with NASA.

The full lesson can be downloaded here.

Filed under: Web Resources

Tags: Astronomy, Internet Resources, Lesson Plans, Web Resources