Solar System
What is the main difference between a planet and a moon?
What is a moon orbits a planet, and a planet orbits a star?
A star is this, and the sun is similar to other stars in this way.
What is a giant ball of gas that produces energy through nuclear fusion, and the sun is also a star?
This motion causes day and night on Earth.
What is Earth's rotation?
When you push an object, this happens.
What is the object moves in the direction of the push?
This is the difference between light and sound energy.
What is light can travel through a vacuum, but sound needs a medium like air?
Earth has these three unique characteristics compared to other planets.
What are liquid water, breathable atmosphere, and a protective magnetic field?
The size of the sun compares to other stars in this way.
What is the sun is medium-sized?
We experience different seasons on Earth because of this.
What is the tilt of Earth's axis as it orbits the sun?
It is harder to move a heavy box than a light box for this reason.
What is because the heavy box has more mass?
Sound travels from a speaker to your ears in this way.
What is through vibrations in the air?
This happens to a planet's gravity when its size increases.
What is its gravity gets stronger?
This is why the sun looks larger and brighter than other stars.
What is because it is much closer to Earth?
The Earth's tilt and orbit affect the length of days during the year in this way.
What is longer days in summer and shorter days in winter?
If you push a toy car and a real car with the same force, the toy car moves faster because of this.
What is the toy car has less mass?
Light behaves this way when it hits a mirror compared to when it passes through glass.
What is it reflects off a mirror and bends (refracts) through glass?
The inner planets are rocky, and the outer planets are gaseous for this reason.
What is because of their distance from the sun and how they formed?
The sun supports life on Earth in this way.
What is by providing light and energy for plants, animals, and humans?
If Earth’s tilt were 0 degrees, this would happen to its seasons.
What is there would be no seasons?
This is a real-world example of how force and mass affect motion.
What is pushing a shopping cart (an empty cart moves faster than a full one)?
You can see lightning before you hear thunder during a storm because of this.
What is light travels faster than sound?
These are the characteristics scientists would look at to classify a new planet.
What are size, orbit, composition, and atmosphere?
If the sun were smaller or larger, life on Earth might change in this way.
What is the temperature would be too cold or too hot for life?
Scientists use Earth’s predictable patterns of motion to do this on other planets.
What is to predict seasons, orbits, and climates on those planets?
Engineers design safer cars using this knowledge about force and mass.
What is by creating crumple zones to absorb force in a collision?
This is a simple experiment to show how light or sound behaves predictably.
What is using a prism to show light bending or a slinky to show sound waves?