Preparing your class for a visit to

the Roth Planetarium

For grades 3 to 12

It would enhance your visit to the Planetarium if you familiarize your students with the following:

Light year is the distance that light travels in one year. The speed of light is 186,000 miles/second.

Measurement of angles ’Äì angles are measured in degrees. There are 360¬ƒ in a circle.

What holds the universe together?

1. What force holds you to Earth? ___________________

Does everything fall to the Earth?

2. Why don’Äôt the stars that we see in the sky fall to the Earth?

3. What force holds the Earth to the sun? ____________

4. What force could hold two stars together so that they travel would around one another.

Nature of Stars, Planets and Moons

1. What is the difference between a planet and a star? Between a moon and a planet?