Comet Activities
The lessons below are teacher-favorite lessons focused on comets. For more search options or to search by other science target, missions and other criteria, visit our Fast Lesson Finder. You can also search by curriculum standards on our popular Curriculum Standards Quilts.
Comets Lessons:
Paper Comet Model with a Deep Impact
Topic: Modeling Solar System Objects
Body: Comets
Mission: Deep Impact (Comets)
Short Description: Participants demonstrate how models can be used to establish the properties of comets.
Seeing in 3-D: Stereo Pairs (Educator Guide)
Grade Level: 5-8
Body: Comets
Mission: Deep Impact (Comets), Stardust (Comets)
Short Description: Students will have an understanding of how to use 2-D images to create 3-D images. Students will gain a better understanding of visible images retrieved from distant spacecrafts. Students will be able to use this technique to study images taken by the Deep Impact spacecraft of Comet Tempel 1 in 2005 and compare those pictures to images taken by the STARDUST spacecraft camera in 2011.
Click here to view the "3D Stereoscopic Viewer" instructions.
Seeing in 3-D: Stereo Pairs (Student Guide)
Grade Level: 5-8
Body: Comets
Mission: Deep Impact (Comets), Stardust (Comets)
Short Description: Students will have an understanding of how to use 2-D images to create 3-D images. Students will gain a better understanding of visible images retrieved from distant spacecrafts. Students will be able to use this technique to study images taken by the Deep Impact spacecraft of Comet Tempel 1 in 2005 and compare those pictures to images taken by the STARDUST spacecraft camera in 2011.
Click here to view the "3D Stereoscopic Viewer" instructions.
Size and Shape Imaged
Topic: Life
Body: Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Asteroids, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Comets, Kuiper Belt & Oort Cloud, Earth's Moon
Short Description: This activity contains a series of images of very small things. Students will view the images, hear the information from a script, and make some observations and connections. They will see Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images and Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) images of small living organisms and rock surfaces. Then, using their new perspective, they will view unidentified samples and speculate about the surfaces and the origins of the features in the images. The goal is to get the students to think about looking at very small objects and to realize
that observations are a great way to start scientific research.
Solar System Exploration Mission Timeline Activity
Topic: Modeling Solar System Objects
Grade Level: 5-8
Body: Our Solar System, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Asteroids, Meteors & Meteorites, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Dwarf Planets, Comets, Kuiper Belt & Oort Cloud, Earth's Moon, Europa
Mission: ARTEMIS (Earth's Moon), Cassini (Saturn), Dawn (Dwarf Planets), DSN (Our Solar System), GRAIL (Earth's Moon), Hubble (Beyond Our Solar System), Huygens (Saturn), IBEX (Our Solar System), InSight (Mars), Juno (Jupiter), Lunar Recon Orbiter (Earth's Moon), MESSENGER (Mercury), NEAR Shoemaker (Asteroids), New Horizons (Dwarf Planets), Phoenix (Mars), Stardust (Comets), Venus Express (Venus), Viking 01 (Mars), Viking 02 (Mars), Voyager 1 (Our Solar System), Voyager 2 (Our Solar System)
Short Description: Extreme Exploration -- Solar System Exploration Missions Timeline involves students in the wide range of mission events of 2008-2015+. Using the Solar System Exploration Timeline poster as a guide, student teams research assigned missions and record events such as launch and landing, etc. It is expected that students will be drawn into the excitement of mission events as they follow along with NASA's Solar System Exploration -- past, current, and future.
Stardust Mission: #1-1 Think Small in a Big Way - Comet Cratering
Topic: Modeling Solar System Objects
Grade Level: K-4, 5-8
Body: Comets
Mission: Stardust (Comets)
Short Description: Students will discover what happens when impactors hit the surface of a planet using balls of different sizes, flour and cocoa.
Through the Eyes of Scientists: Around and Around - Everything is Moving
Grade Level: K-4
Body: Our Solar System, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Asteroids, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Comets, Kuiper Belt & Oort Cloud, Earth's Moon
Mission: Voyager 1 (Our Solar System), Voyager 2 (Our Solar System)
Short Description: Learning about the ever-moving objects in our solar system through the eyes of Scientist-Adventurer, Dr. Edward Stone. This lesson is part of the Through the Eyes of Scientists formal education product.
Through the Eyes of Scientists: Space Can Be a Chilly Place - Ice Is Nice!
Grade Level: K-4
Body: Our Solar System, Mercury, Earth, Mars, Asteroids, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Comets, Kuiper Belt & Oort Cloud, Earth's Moon
Mission: Cassini (Saturn)
Short Description: Learning about ice in the solar system through the eyes of Scientist-Arctic Space Explorer, Mr. Ben Holt. This lesson is part of the Through the Eyes of Scientists formal education product.
Through the Eyes of Scientists: What is a Planet?
Grade Level: K-4
Body: Our Solar System, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Asteroids, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Comets, Kuiper Belt & Oort Cloud, Earth's Moon
Short Description: Learning about the Sun and the planets as a "treasure map" through the eyes of Scientist-Treasure Hunter, Dr. Phil Chamberlin.
Voyage: A Journey Through Our Solar System -- Lesson 8: Comets: Bringers of Life?
Topic: Modeling Solar System Objects
Grade Level: 5-8
Body: Comets
Short Description: Comets are an important class of objects found in the solar system. Created at the time of solar system formation, these "dirty snowballs" -- each the size of a city -- have remained virtually unchanged for billions of years in the cold outer reaches of the solar system. Their composition therefore provides clues as to how the solar system was
born, and comet impacts on the early Earth may have been the source of the molecules needed for the formation of life -- organic molecules. In the first activity, students explore the relative abundance of different atoms in the universe, and the molecules that are created from these atoms. In the second activity, students combine ingredients composed
of these molecules to build a good physical model of a comet. The model provides an understanding of cometary composition and structure, and how comets behave when some make a rare trip into the inner solar system and interact with the sun.
