Page 409 - Canadian BC Science 9

11-2B
The Length of the School Year on Different Planets
Find Out ACTIVITY
Earth takes 12 months to orbit around the Sun once. Students spend about 75 percent of their year in school. Although that may seem like a long time, it could be longer if you were a student on another planet.
In this activity, you will determine the length of school years on other planets.
Materials
• pencil
• paper
• calculator
• graph paper
What to Do
1. Copy the following table into your notebook.
2. Calculate the school year on each planet relative to a school year on Earth.
Example:
Earth school year = 9 months
Mercury year (relative to Earth’s) = 0.24 Earth years
Mercury school year = 0.24 􏰀 9 months = 2.16 months
3. Draw a graph of your data. Plot the planet names on the x-axis and the number of months on the y-axis:
Planet
Mercury Venus Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune
Period of Revolution (relative to 1 Earth year)
School Year (months)
2.16
0.24
0.61
1.70
11.90
29.50
84.00
165.00
4. Connect the points with a best-fit straight line. What Did You Find Out?
1. What did you notice about the length of the school year as you moved farther from the Sun?
2. What does the slope of the line tell you about change in the length of the school year?
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Chapter 11 The components of the universe are separated by unimaginably vast distances. • MHR 391
Months
Mercury Venus