What You’ll Need

• Styrofoam ball
• Knife
• Paint
• Scissors
• Cardstock
• Poster board
• Glue
• Markers
• Cardboard tubes
• Cardstock
• Penny

What to Do

1. Carefully cut a Styrofoam ball in half. Let your kid paint each half to look like a planet. Let dry.
2. From cardstock, cut out eight asteroids, two stars, and one black hole.
3. Arrange the objects on poster board. Glue them in place. Use a marker to draw a path connecting the objects, starting at one planet and ending at the other. Write “START” and “FINISH.”
4. Make a rocket ship for each player using a cardboard tube and cardstock.
5. Cover a penny with cardstock. Write “1” on one side and “2” on the other.

To Play

Players place their rocket ships on START. Taking turns, they flip the coin and move the number of spaces shown, from object to object. The first player to reach FINISH wins.

Extend the Fun

For younger kids: Write your name in crayon at the top of a piece of paper, making each letter a different color. Write the name of each planet on its own line below your name (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune). Compare each planet name to your name; look for matching letters, and when you find one, circle it with the corresponding color crayon. Finally, count the matching letters. Which planet name is most like your name?

For older kids: Accelerate your research. What is an asteroid? A black hole? A terrestrial planet? A Jovian planet? These deserve further exploration!

Game by April Theis, text by Mary Sears.