TD Summer Reading Club Week 3:Ages 7 and 8

We went on an out of this world adventure for the third week of the Summer Reading Program! We talked about all the different planets and named as many as we could remember. There are eight planets in total: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. We talked about the first living thing that went into space: it was a dog!! On November 3^rd 1957, a Russian dog named Laïka was launched into space in a shuttle called Spoutnik II. We learned some really awesome facts about space: like if you wrote something on the moon's surface it would stay there for millions of years because there isn't any wind or rain on the moon! 

Here are some other facts we learned!
•One million Earths could fit inside the Sun

•Venus is the hottest planet in our solar system with a surface temperature of over 450 degrees celcius

•Saturn isn't the only ringed planet, other gas giants such as Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune also have rings, they are just less obvious.

•The USA’s NASA Apollo 11 mission in 1969 was the first manned Moon landing.

•To become a NASA trainee, you are required to be a US citizen, you must pass a strict physical examination, have 20/20 vision, and good blood pressure.

The first book we read was Aliens love Underpants (and we loved this story!)

We pretended to be on the moon for our next game, which was a gravity motion game. We moved around really fast while we were still on earth and the moment I said “We’re on the Moon!” we started moving really slow like we were moving through jello. 

The second book we read was How to Catch a Star: 

I tested everyone's space knowledge with some Trivia Questions! Here are some of the questions I asked:

-Is the Sun a planet or a star? (A Star)

-What's the closest planet to the sun? (Mercury)

-About how long does it take the moon to orbit the Earth? (28 days)

-From which direction do we see the sun rise? (East)

The last book we read was Baloney (Henry P.)

We moved onto our first craft which was our Summer Reading Program Wall of Stars! We all decorated a star with our name then hung it on the night sky.

Our second craft was our Alien UFO. We took a plastic bowl and covered it with tinfoil, put the alien (made out of yarn) inside the cup and taped it all together!

These UFOs also doubled as alien hats!!

Are you looking for some other space books? Here are some suggestions! 

The spotlight will be on you next week because You're a Star!! come join at center stage to talk about puppets, theater and so much more!

Don’t forget to bring in your reading notebook next time, with all your readings from the past week so you can enter into the weekly prize. The prize will be drawn Friday at 4:00!