Pluto was demoted from planet status a little over three years ago in August 2006. I don’t know why exactly, but this made me a little sad at the time. But I moved on and, honestly, have thought very little about Pluto ever since.
Until yesterday…
The curriculum, Considering God’s Creation, I’m using for Harrison this year for science is outdated, at least where planets are concerned. They still teach that our solar system has nine planets, and that Pluto is full-fledged and not a dwarf planet. That’s fine. I just reminded Harrison of the media events of three years ago and moved on. But when I was teaching him my tried and true acrostic to learn the planets’ names, I was stumped. This is the same acrostic that I cut my planetary teeth on a few decades ago. It’s the same one that I taught Bonny Annie just four years ago. It works. Teach them the above, and kids will learn the planets and their order.
Now that Pluto has been stripped, how would you alter the saying? My very eager mother just served us noodles? Now that just doesn’t work. What is eager about serving noodles? How about My very eager mother just served us nothing? How bland. No, she has to serve us something. My very eager mother just served us naked? Wrong on so many levels. My very eager mother just served us nectarines? Oh brother. We need pizza! We need Pluto!
You know, now that I’m pondering this whole situation, I think Uranus would have been the planet to boot. I mean you can’t mention that planet without getting snickers….not even to the solitary nine year-old fourth grader at your dining room table. Without Uranus, the acrostic still works: My very eager mother just served nine pizzas. See? She doesn’t have to serve them to us. She just has to serve pizzas, otherwise the whole sentence just falls flat.
Okay, who’s with me? Keep Pluto. Boot Uranus.
Now, if you’ll please excuse me, I have a petition to write….
ROFL- I faced the same dilemma when teaching my kids. We also had issues when we were learning the oceans of the world. I only learned the Indian, Atlantic, Artic, and Pacific (I Am A Person). Now I’m told there are 5. (Southern). I guess we could change it to I Am A Sad (silly, snazzy, southern) Person, but it doesn’t work either. Wish they would leave the universe alone.
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My very eager mother just served us nine dwarf pizzas.
How hard was that?
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Braden is still in denial that Pluto has been demoted. Whenever we talk about planets and I remind him, he says, “Well, I’m just ignoring that.” Which makes me wonder how many other things I am teaching him that he is just deciding to ignore.
Haha, Uranus. We have a scaled down universe thing that has the planets all around campus. Uranus is on a rock in front of the chapel… on very hot days, “Hey, is that sweat on Uranus??” etc., etc., etc. David and I used to lay in bed at night thinking of off-handed, and obviously immature, things he could say about Uranus!!!
Where would the humor be without Uranus??!!!!!
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Oh Susan… Too funny! Thinking back Science would not have been nearly as much fun or as disgusting without Uranus. You would probably have the vote of many a middle school Science teacher.
You don’t need to alter anything. Rejecting the demotion of Pluto is NOT denial. It is a legitimate scientific perspective shared by some of the leading planetary scientists in the world.
Pluto is still a planet. Only four percent of the IAU voted on the controversial demotion, and most are not planetary scientists. Their decision was immediately opposed in a formal petition by hundreds of professional astronomers led by Dr. Alan Stern, Principal Investigator of NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto. One reason the IAU definition makes no sense is it says dwarf planets are not planets at all! That is like saying a grizzly bear is not a bear, and it is inconsistent with the use of the term “dwarf” in astronomy, where dwarf stars are still stars, and dwarf galaxies are still galaxies. Also, the IAU definition classifies objects solely by where they are while ignoring what they are. If Earth were in Pluto’s orbit, according to the IAU definition, it would not be a planet either. A definition that takes the same object and makes it a planet in one location and not a planet in another is essentially useless. Pluto is a planet because it is spherical, meaning it is large enough to be pulled into a round shape by its own gravity–a state known as hydrostatic equilibrium and characteristic of planets, not of shapeless asteroids held together by chemical bonds. These reasons are why many astronomers, lay people, and educators are either ignoring the demotion entirely or working to get it overturned.
Using the broader definition of planet preferred by Stern and like-minded scientists, which is that a planet is any non-self-luminous spheroidal body in orbit around a star, our solar system now has 13 planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Ceres, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake, and Eris.
Laurel Kornfeld´s last blog ..Planet Pluto Lives