Wondering about the Space

The space inquiry has been one of the longest running inquiry till date by Sid and Nidhi. This inquiry is filled with lot of "I wonder" questions.We are still learning something new everyday about the awesome universe.  I cannot believe the depth and rich experiences these kids attain through inquiry. The advantage of this child led self directed learning at home is that they learn at their pace without time constraints. This inquiry is ongoing for about six months now and the zeal to learn more has not yet diminished.

One day the twins were observing the globe and out came the query - " Are penguins in Antarctica standing upside down? Won't they fall down into Space?" This triggered our exploration into gravity. We checked if all things that are thrown up will fall back down.

Next came the wondering. Do all planets have gravity? What is gravity made of? Does moon have gravity? We collected answers to these questions by watching a couple of YouTube videos.

Next the kids started focusing on the solar system. This is their initial understanding of the solar system. They just assumed that the planets go around the sun in a circle.

Their initial thought about Solar System - All planets  go around the sun in a circle.

Gradually they learnt about orbits and moons.

Documenting their knowledge of orbits

We learnt about each planet in detail from books. They imbibed facts about planets by lot of role playing and through creating their own puppet shows. A lot of questions arose about the planets most of them leading to Big bang theory . They also made a lot of inferences.

Why planets vary in sizes?

Why is Uranus blue in color? We figured out that the blue shade observed is due to the methane gas in its atmosphere.

How did earth cool down into rocky planet if it is nearer to sun?

Where did iron in mars come from?

Does Neptune have rings?

If Uranus is tilted because a meteor hit it, why didn't it burn up the meteor ?

Do gas giants eventually burn up like stars? -Sid No they can't -Nidhi why not, gas can burn up? - Sid

I think millions of hot gas planets combined to make sun.

If Pluto is called dwarf planet because of its size, why not little Mercury a dwarf planet? - Sid

When Jupiter has so many moons, why not Mars' moons were attracted by Jupiter?

What will happen if sun burns up? I think earth will get icy - Nidhi

Nidhi made a book on "What will happen if meteor falls on each planet?" She guesses that the meteor will make craters on rocky planets and burn up when they hit gas giants.

We read a book about Hubble telescope and they wanted to build a model of it.

Building a Hubble model with recyclables

What can I see through this telescope?

We attended a local library event where NASA Astronaut Megan Mcarthur talked to kids about her experiences of flying to space, living in ISS and working with hubble telescope. The kids were impressed.

Astronaut Megan McArthur answering questions from kids

Mars, Jupiter and Saturn become favorites.
We went star gazing to look at Jupiter in early evening sky in August. They were very happy to spot Mars and Venus early in the morning.

We talked about living on Mars. They were willing to go there and build houses as pioneers if their cousins accompanied them. They drew pictures imagining living on Mars.  They were able to visualize the Mars sky. They could see two Mars' moons - Phobos and deimos, Earth and sun on Mars sky.
They wondered "Will Earth cause an eclipse in Mars when it comes between the sun and Mars?"

we read about Mars rovers. A Mars Rover with snap circuits is in the anvil at their Makerspace.

Nidhi's plan for a Mars Rover

Sid's vision of his landing on Mars

Nidhi with her cousin on Mars

We discussed about Cassini's journey. I posed them a question about NASA's plan about sending a probe to sun. "How will you design a probe to sun that will not get burnt up?" , I asked.
Nidhi thought and answered "What if we send a probe that is already hot?" Hmm... Nice thought!

They learnt about milkyway and types of galaxies.They used watercolor techniques to paint beautiful galaxies, black holes etc.

Types of galaxies documentation

Painting of galaxies with Watercolors

Sid painting a black hole

"Look! This black hole is burping a jet after eating a star!" - Sid

We got a Space edition of Scientific American "Wonder of the cosmos" magazine, that you can see in the photo above. The magazine was filled with wonderful articles about black holes, nebulae, lifecycle of stars, multiverses etc. We also discussed about the recent discovery of gravitational waves.

They were pretending balls as planets and suddenly got idea of coloring them as planets. Thus our own solar system model was created.

Nidhi painting the sun - "It looks green because the ball is blue, if I add more yellow, it will look like sun."

Sid painting a basketball as Jupiter

Beautiful Venus

Solar system model - They chose appropriate sized balls for each planet

They made up some silly jokes like
What Jupiter said to Saturn? Nice belt buddy!
What did the black hole tell the star? I am going to gobble you up!

Nidhi wondered, if an object falls into a blackhole, where will it be?

They have started documenting their understanding in writing. This gives them a much needed writing practice too.

Sid's Solar system documentation

Nidhi's writeup about solar system

Their inquiries have kindled a lot of curiosity in me. I am learning a lot alongside them.
They are still wondering and pondering every day about this awesome universe. I hope they continue this inquiry till the very end.
To me, the universe is some scary dark mystery.
But Sid and Nidhi sing these verses as a matter of fact way.
" We are made of stardust , every single atom..."
Every night before going to bed, Sid comments " Look Mom, our sky is the universe, we are part of this universe." How surreal!