Planets, Proportions, and Pottery in Palm Beach County School District - The Seminole Ridge Solar System Scale Model.

Planets, Proportions, and Pottery in Palm Beach County School District

The Seminole Ridge Solar System Scale Model.

Statement I: Project Description

The Seminole Solar System Scale Model is an interdisciplinary exploration of art, science, and math. The model will include multiple displays, each representing one of the naked eye planets, placed at a scaled distance from the first marker – the Sun. The model will encompass the campuses across the Indian Trail Improvement District, starting with the Sun at Seminole Ridge High School, and stretching back to the elementary and middle school through which pupils progressed. The displays will give students, parents, teachers, and community partners a visual understanding of the vast distances spacecraft must travel to explore other regions of the solar system.

In a classroom activity, students relate the concepts of measurement to similarity and proportionality in real-world situations and accurately scale the distance between the Sun and the planets of the solar system. Adapted from NASA teacher guides and the Google Lunar X Prize, students use a basketball to depict Earth’s size. Logically progressing, students are asked how far to place away the Sun and the Moon to accurately represent an eclipse. Within these ratios, students compute a scale model of the solar system. Students next concretely represent those worlds using ceramics. Working with NASA images from unmanned missions as inspiration and for accuracy, student artists use slab and coil methods in construction. They will create textures and pattern in clay as they create relief depictions of topographic features such as continents and craters. And they will explore pottery decorating techniques as they glaze their globes. The “finished” products with explanatory captions and locational graphics will be viewable at the feeder schools to Seminole Ridge High. Over 3000 individuals in the community can potentially be reached through class work and art display:

The Sun - by far the largest thing in our solar system - is 86 feet wide sitting in the center of Seminole Ridge Community High School.

Closest to the Sun is Mercury, at the Winn-Dixie supermarket plaza (5060 Seminole Pratt Whitney Road, Loxahatchee). In reality, the average distance from the Sun to Mercury is roughly 58,000,000 km (35,000,000 miles) or 0.4 AU.

Earth's orbit takes it at the perfect distance from the Sun for life to flourish, through Frontier Elementary and Oscela Creek Middle, and Lion Country Safari. Venus is too hot. Mars is too cold. Scientists sometimes call our region of space the "Goldilocks Zone" because it appears to be just right for life. Earth's average distance to the Sun is about 150,000,000 km (93,000,000 miles) from the Sun. That's 1 AU.

Mars' orbit stretches through Loxahatchee Groves Elementary, Golden Groves Elementary School and Western Pines Middle, and at the Publix Supermarket plaza (7050 Seminole Pratt Whitney Road, Loxahatchee). The red planet is about 228,000,000 km (142,000,000 miles) on average from the Sun. That's 1.5 AU.

The main Asteroid Belt extends over Pierce Hammock Elementary School, Acreage Pines Elementary, Royal Palm Beach Elementary, HL Johnson Elementary, and Loxahatchee Groves Park on Southern Blvd. Asteroids roam far and wide in our solar system. But most are contained within the main asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars. In real distances that's an average of roughly 300,000,000 to 600,000,000 km (186,000,000 to 372,000,000 miles) from the Sun, or 2 to 4 AU.

Jupiter's realm extends to Palm Beach Central High, the Mall at Wellington Green, and North Palm Beach County General Aviation Airport. Our solar system's largest planet is an average distance of 778,000,000 km (484,000,000 miles) from the Sun. That's 5.2 AU.

Saturn circles the Sun at Christa McAulifee Middle, Park Vista Community High, John D. McArthur Beach State Park, Scripps Institute (130 Scripps Way, near Jupiter, FL 33458), the South Florida Science Museum (4801 Dreher Trail N., West Palm Beach, FL 33415), Ocean Reef Park in Lake Worth, and Palm Beach County Park Airport in Lake Worth. The ringed world is about 1,427,000,000 km (887,000,000 miles) from the Sun, or 9.5 AU.

Alpha Centauri would be twice the distance to the Moon (the real Moon) on this scale! The next nearest star is 39,900,000,000,000 km (25,370,000,000,000 miles) from the Sun, or 271,000 AU away. This means at a distance of 4.3 light-years, we see this triple star system not as it is, but as it was 4 years ago, when the senior was still a freshman, the 8th grader was still in elementary school, in 4th grade.



Statement II: Benefit to Students

A county wide model of the solar system should provide visual learners the background to comprehend the scale, which compliments the mathematic conceptualization derived from the classroom activity. A tactile experience of grandeur helps contextualize the following grade appropriate benchmarks for the Florida Sunshine State Standards. Grade 4: recognize that Earth revolves around the Sun in a year. Grade 5: recognize the major common characteristics of all planets and compare/contrast the properties of inner and outer planets; Grade 8: recognize that there are enormous distances between objects in space; compare and contrast the properties of objects in the Solar System, such as gravitational force, distance from the Sun, speed, movement, temperature, and atmospheric conditions. Grades 9-12: develop logical connections through physical principles, including Kepler's and Newton's Laws about the relationships and the effects of Earth, Moon, and Sun on each other. The Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) is an annual criterion-referenced test assessing student achievement on the knowledge and skills described in the state curriculum framework called the Sunshine State Standards. The classroom activities and hands-on lab exercises include practice in FCAT performance tasks. The target for area school population (3000+ students) participating in the solar system scale model is 100% of students at Level 3 or above mastery scores for FCAT related review in mathematics, reading, and science during classroom activity. Students will also impacted by mastering basic techniques (i.e., clay preparation, hand-building, preparing glazes, decorating, surface design, and kiln operation) to produce ceramics and pottery, and demonstrate use of collaborative skills to exhibit works of art in the school and community. As such, evaluating the effectiveness of artistic mastery from a planet plate is dependant on conceptualization (design, color, originality) and execution (workmanship and skill). Lastly, public comments are welcome by the principals.

Appendix

• The Maine Solar System Model extends from Presque Isle to Houlton, ME to illustrate planet size and distance, over forty miles (64.4 km) from Pluto to Sun.


• Planet Panorama This Ohio University-produced exhibit brings the relative size and distance between planets in our solar system into focus on a football field.