World Space Week is upon us and there’s no better opportunity to encourage your children to explore beyond Earth.
World Space Week has grown into the largest public space event on Earth. More than 3,700 events in 80 countries celebrated the benefits of space and excitement about space exploration in 2017. The 2018 theme is “Space Unites The World”.
To help celebrate Work Space Week we’ve compiled three of our favourite Space related activities for the whole family.
Space Descent with Tim Peake at the Science Museum
From rockets to satellites, probes to landers, visit the space descent VR where Tim Peake is your guide for an out-of-this-world virtual reality mission that puts you in the pilot’s seat of a Soyuz capsule.
Using the latest state-of-the-art VR technology, you’ll get a 360° look inside a Soyuz capsule and experience the thrill of being an astronaut. Space Descent VR retraces the 400km journey back to Earth from the ISS, and is narrated by Tim Peake.
For a crafty afternoon with the children, here’s how you make marbled planets!
Supplies you will need:
- black and white cardstock paper (12-inch by 12-inch size)
- acrylic paint in several colours
- shaving cream
- 3 foil containers
- rubber spatula
- toothpicks
- squeegee
- gold glitter glue
- sponge brush or paint brush
- glue stick
Directions:
1) Start by cutting 3 different sized circle shapes from your white cardstock paper. I used different sized cups and containers to trace my circles.
2) Squirt shaving cream into your foil containers, enough to fill the bottom of the pans. Use your rubber spatula to spread the shaving cream out evenly and make it as smooth as you can.
3) Squirt various colours of acrylic paint onto your shaving cream. We do lines in various directions. Use your toothpick to make lines up and down, side to side and diagonally to create a marbled look in your paint.
4) Press your circle down into the paint and lightly rub all over the circle to get the shaving cream to stick to the entire circle. Carefully remove the circle from the paint and let it sit for 1-2 minutes. Use your squeegee to remove the shaving cream from your circle. You are left with a beautiful marbled planet.
5) Glue your planets onto your black cardstock paper.
6) Finish your art by painting some gold glitter all over the black part of your paper. The gold glitter glue adds a bit of shine and the glitter makes it looks like little stars.
Why not work with your children’s school to organise a talk with Rocks & Robots? Rocks & Robots is an interactive talk that’s all about hunting for the geology of Earth, elsewhere in the solar system.
Children can explore volcanoes, ice caps, meteorite impacts and oceans and will be taken on a tour of the solar system to see what they can find.