Description
What our Planets: Neptune lesson plan includes
Lesson Objectives and Overview: Planets: Neptune is a high-interest reading comprehension lesson plan. As such, students will practice various close reading and comprehension skills. In addition, they will learn about this beautiful blue planet in our solar system. This lesson is for students in 3rd grade, 4th grade, and 5th grade.
Classroom Procedure
Every lesson plan provides you with a classroom procedure page that outlines a step-by-step guide to follow. You do not have to follow the guide exactly. The guide helps you organize the lesson and details when to hand out worksheets. It also lists information in the yellow box that you might find useful. You will find the lesson objectives, state standards, and number of class sessions the lesson should take to complete in this area. In addition, it describes the supplies you will need as well as what and how you need to prepare beforehand. The activity requires a number of supplies, including CDs, foam balls, and paperclips. You may want to cut the foam balls in half ahead of time.
Teacher Notes
The teacher notes page provides an extra paragraph of information to help guide the lesson and remind you what to focus on. It explains that you can teach this lesson in a whole-class setting or as an independent, small-group activity. The blank lines on this page are available for you to write out thoughts and ideas you have as you prepare the lesson.
PLANETS: NEPTUNE LESSON PLAN CONTENT PAGES
Introduction to Neptune
The Planets: Neptune lesson plan contains two content pages. Neptune is a planet that sits far from Earth, almost 2.7 billion miles away! It is the eighth planet from the sun and the last planet in our solar system. Scientists named it after the Roman god of the sea because of the planet’s deep blue color, which reminds people of the ocean. They discovered it in 1846, and they were amazed by how different it was from the planets closer to us.
The striking blue color of this planet is one of its defining features. This color comes from the methane gas in its atmosphere, which absorbs red light and reflects blue light. Unlike Earth, Neptune doesn’t have a solid, rocky surface. It’s a big ball of gas and ice, making it a “gas giant.” If you could stand on it (which, of course, you can’t), you would just sink into thick clouds of hydrogen and helium. 3Neptune has faint rings of dust and ice, although they are not nearly as bright or noticeable as Saturn’s. These rings are uneven as well. Some parts are thicker than other parts. Scientists believe the planet’s gravity creates strange patterns in the rings, making them pretty unique in the solar system.
Of all the planets in the solar system, Neptune has some of the wildest weather. It is famous for its powerful storms, including the Great Dark Spot, a massive storm as big as Earth, and that’s not an exaggeration! Winds on Neptune can reach 1,200 miles per hour, which is faster than the speed of sound. Whoosh! Scientists study Neptune’s weather using telescopes and spacecraft like Voyager 2, which flew past the planet in 1989.
Moons and Temperature
Neptune has 14 known moons. They have fascinating names like Triton, Proteus, and Nereid. The biggest moon, Triton, is intriguing because it orbits the planet backward, the opposite way most moons orbit their planets. As of now, Triton is the coldest place in the entire solar system. It even has icy volcanoes that shoot frozen nitrogen into the air!
Scientists believe that life as we know it couldn’t possibly survive on Neptune. Its atmosphere is full of poisonous gases, and its temperatures are freezing, dropping as low as -373°F (-225°C). If any life existed there, it would have to be very different from life on Earth, like something that could survive in extreme cold without any oxygen.
Atmosphere and Geological Features
Did you know that a year on Neptune is incredibly long? It takes 165 Earth years for Neptune to orbit the sun just once! Since its discovery in 1846, it has completed only one orbit. Because it is so far away, scientists have studied it using telescopes and spacecraft. Voyager 2 gave us the first close-up pictures of the planet and its moons. Today, powerful telescopes on Earth and in space continue to study Neptune, helping us learn more about its mysteries.
Compared to Earth’s, Neptune’s magnetic field is very unusual. On Earth, the magnetic field lines up almost perfectly with the planet’s axis, but Neptune tilts about 47 degrees. It doesn’t line up with the center of the planet. This makes the magnetic field uneven and kind of lopsided. Scientists think this happens because the magnetic field might result from movements of salty water or other materials deep inside.
Even though we can’t visit Neptune, studying it helps scientists understand how planets form and evolve. This planet’s extreme conditions make it a perfect example of a planet entirely different from Earth. Just because it’s different, though, doesn’t mean it’s not helpful to learn about. Neptune is a fascinating planet full of mystery. From its deep blue color and wild storms to its icy moons, there is much to learn about this distant world. It may not support life, but Neptune helps us understand the universe and our place in it.
PLANETS: NEPTUNE LESSON PLAN WORKSHEETS
The Planets: Neptune lesson plan includes two worksheets: an activity worksheet and a practice worksheet. Each one will help students solidify their grasp of the material they learned throughout the lesson. You can refer to the classroom procedure guidelines to know when to hand out each worksheet.
PLANETARY FACT RELAY ACTIVITY WORKSHEET
For the activity, students will follow the directions to complete a fun relay race. First, they will use the supplies to set up the course and prepare fact cards about Neptune. Then they will follow the game instructions to participate in the relay.
PLANETS: NEPTUNE REVIEW PRACTICE WORKSHEET
The practice worksheet lists 10 questions based on the content. These questions all relate to the content pages, so students will need to refer to them often for the answers. In addition, each question provides which reading tool the question corresponds to, such as text feature, vocabulary, or comprehension.
Worksheet Answer Keys
At the end of the lesson plan document is an answer key for the practice worksheet. The correct answers are all in red to make it easier for you to compare them with students’ responses. If you choose to administer the lesson pages to your students via PDF, you will need to save a new file that omits these pages. Otherwise, you can simply print out the applicable pages and keep these as reference for yourself when grading assignments.
