Pace the Solar System

During the Cassini event that my Oklahoma Space Grant put on last school year, I was helping with different workshops and got to participate in one of the coolest things for educational outreach that I'd done in a long time. It involves pacing off the Solar System to scale, using an 8" diameter ball as the sun, and scaling from there.

I didn't think our speakers were showing up on Wednesday, so I looked up the specifics of the activity. It takes over half a mile using the scale in the linked activity, so I had us walk it off around the pond. It wasn't a straight line, but you did have a clear shot to see the starting point off across the water.

Also, a little over halfway through our normal 7 pm speaker time, the sunset starts, so we always see these gorgeous pink skies outside during our lectures. For this activity, we got to be outside during one of the prettiest I've seen here, and I took a lot of pictures. As usual.

This is a great great outreach activity because not only does it not involve sitting and watching slides or hearing someone yap, which kids can't stand, but it also proves a really amazing point about the positions of the planets in the Solar System. After doing it that first time, I realized that I didn't even really have a good concept of those relative positions. But I do now.

It's a good idea to walk it off by yourself beforehand to make sure you have room. I did it all before I had everyone meet, but I moved my starting point halfway through my practice run so we wouldn't be ending up on the complete opposite side of everything. We ended up having pacing disputes at around Uranus/Neptune. But it all worked out, and I think it was a nice break from having lectures.

Anyway, here's the link to the scaled activity that I used:
http://www.noao.edu/education/peppercorn/pcmain.html

Timely update: Whoo! There's an even better chance that it could launch when we're in FL! http://www.space.com/returntoflight/ C'mon, next weekend!!