Kaia and I took a little detour from our scheduled homeschooling (detours are fun!) to study a little about comets and meteors. The Leonid Meteor Shower is at it’s peak Tuesday and Wed. (I wrote a little about it at Homemakers Who Work), and we plan to set up a cozy spot outside tonight (well, more like early, early tomorrow morning) to watch the show!
Talking about comets and meteors brought up that “what if…” question that seems to pass through every kids head when they are learning about this stuff… “What if a meteor gets through the earth’s atmosphere and hits us???!!!”
We found some great pictures of craters online…
Here is a nice picture of a crater made by a meteor that struck the earth.
And there are some great pictures of the moon’s craters on This site.
And we also did a little experiment to make our own craters….
Comet Kaia zoomed past our bowl filled with flour and cocoa powder (Planet Yum).
On her way past the planet, she dropped a little meteor rocks (marbles) into the planet’s atmosphere. Down went the meteor rocks!
It landed with a nice puff of ‘planet dust’ (it actually puffed out all over the floor). And craters were created.
Next time, I want to get a bunch of flour and put it outside so we can really throw rocks into the pile and make big craters and large puffs of earth! (Am I showing my destructive side?)
This looks like great fun. Thanks for the cool links!
I meant to add that seeing your experiment made me think we’d try that tomorrow with chocolate chunks for rocks and then turn it into moon rock cookie dough 🙂
Ohhh, that sounds fun!!
Hi, I have stalked your blog for awhile 🙂 I live in Chapel Hill and had talked to you once when you had Veriditas….and I just recently read the newest Botanica (I am an herbalist in Aviva’s program) and there you were! Nice interview…
Just wanted to say thanks for sharing all this great info about your house and homeschooling etc. I love checking your blog periodically!
Maybe we’ll meet at some herbal function one day 🙂
My son wouldso love to play “destruction”. How cool!
Can not seem to find your email so hopefully mine shows with this comment to you.
Please be sure to email me your address so I can get your Scone pan to you.
Congratulations again!
what a fun idea! i like the idea of turning it into cookies too! 🙂
we missed the meteor shower this year due to heavy cloud coverage all week long. 🙁 maybe next year…
Hey there, Just started reading your blog a few days ago. I am so inspired! I love that you read something, get inspired, do it and then tell us how it worked for you when you did it yourself and take pictures all the while! Wonderful! I am totally going to make a bower for my kids beds and am going to make those story dice for friends this christmas! Cheers!
Hello, I just found your blog via In need of Chocolate, and I’m really enjoying reading your posts. This one made me think of one of our current favourite songs – They Might be Giants’ What is a shooting star:
http://www.amazon.com/What-Is-A-Shooting-Star/dp/B002P352Z8/ref=sr_1_15?ie=UTF8&qid=1259823161&sr=1-15
It would link in nicely with your comets and meteors!