Astronomy, 3-6, 6-9
The Solar System Puzzle is a tangible representation of the celestial bodies of our Solar System. Children are always fascinated by the outer space; the puzzle offers a global view of what is happening from the Sun to the Kipper Belt.
Materials
–The Solar System puzzle contains a wooden puzzle, a control chart, and wooden labels that include:
Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Moon (Earth), Moons (Jupiter), Moons (Saturn), Moons (Uranus), Asteroid Belt, Kuiper Belt, Asteroid, Comet, Nebula, Nova, Supernova, Galaxy, and Black hole.
–The Solar System nomenclature cards (6-9)
22 three part cards sets representing all elements from the puzzle, which contain pictures and labels, pictures, labels, descriptions and labels, descriptions, close test descriptions.
1 booklet that serves as a control for errors
1 control chart
How you can use it
The wooden puzzle comes with wooden arrows to label all parts of the puzzle. A child can begin to label the different parts of the puzzle using the control chart.
All parts from the puzzle are moveable. Therefore, a child can create a linear representation of the solar system, starting with the Sun on the left. Other bodies or phenomena (supernova, galaxy, black hole…) can be set away from the Sun and the planets to show that they are distant from our solar system. The Asteroid and Kuiper belts can be placed in their respective places within our solar system as well.
Once the child has an understanding of where each body or phenomenon may in the universe, they can begin to work with the nomenclature cards. The easiest way to introduce the nomenclature cards is to begin with the picture-label to the left, the picture to its right, and the label below the picture. If the child is comfortable with reading, he may place the picture-label cards to the left, and match the description-label cards to the right.
Once familiar with the content of the nomenclature cards, the child can use the description cards without label, or use the close test cards (containing a blank in the text).
For primary level, please see The Solar System Puzzle and Nomenclature Cards 3-6.
