“What is space?” I asked KS2.
First we learnt that space is a difficult and dangerous place to be and constantly expanding meaning the position of planets and galaxies is always changing. We realised how important a space suit is to an astronauts – protecting them from extreme temperatures, fast flying dust and stopping their bodies from expanding! We watched a marshmallow man expand in a vacuum and explored design features of the space suit.
Did you know that the visor is coated in a very thin film of gold to protect astronauts’ eyes from the sun’s rays?
And then finally, before we visited the space dome, we tried in pairs to ‘dock, an astronaut onto the International Space Station (a cup!).
Then we visited the Space Explorer Dome
We had an opportunity to discuss questions like:
If humans lived on Mars, should it be split up into different countries?
Should one country own all of space?
What is valuable in space? Should it be finders keepers?
Here are some of our responses.
In the afternoon, we became scientists and conducted 2 experiments:
1. What makes a rocket launch successful? What if questions included: What if we added more tablets? What if we shook the canister more? What if we added more water? What if we mixed the two different types of tablets together?
2. How are craters formed and what affects their shape? What if questions included: What if we increased the height that the marble is dropped? What if the surface is deeper? What if we changed the shape of the object being dropped? What if we dropped two marbles at the same time?
And once the day was over, these were some of the comments made: I learnt how some stars are put together to make different pictures. I absolutely loved the science dome and was amazed by the stars. I enjoyed the science tests and experiments. The dome was good, really cool. I loved the stars, it felt like you were moving. I liked both experiments but the rocket one was my favourite. It was the best day -the science dome. IT WAS BRILL! I thought it was a really fun day. I loved the science experiments the most (especially the rocket bit). I liked the rocket thing but it didn’t work. I thought the space dome was scary. The Explorer Dome was the best part of the day and I learnt a lot about space. I really want to do the space dome again!
