How big and how far?

Today in science, we learned about Earth's moon and the lunar cycle.  One of the things we explored was the scale of size and distance between Earth and our moon.  We used a small globe and an even smaller styrofoam ball to model the size difference, but we weren't sure about the distance.  Our prediction was that, according to our scale, the little Earth would be 32 centimeters from the little moon.

But, what we learned is that our moon is actually 30 Earth diameters away from us.  So, using that scale we actually needed to make the distance over ten times our prediction!  360 centimeters!  Check it out:

Turns out that space is mostly made up of just that: space!

STEM Day Remembered

Last week, we went on a field trip to Clayton High School to take part in the annual 5th grade STEM day.  STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.  Students and teachers were mixed into random groups across all three elementary school 5th grades and traveled through stations emphasizing STEM in careers.  Stations included: bio-med, robotics, electronics, botany, aeronautics, Bloxels, and engineering/calculator graphing.  Teachers and high school students facilitated activities at each station to help us learn.  It was a great day!  Enjoy some shots I was able to capture as I traveled with my group: