Space is one of my absolute favorite subjects to teach each year! I love how engaged the students are and how interesting all of the content is. Students are always so excited to learn about the wonders of space. Students especially love to learn about our neighbors in space. I have four digital space activities for 5th grade that will engage all of your students and get them excited about your space unit!
Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter are four fascinating planets that your students will love learning about! Each planet product has TONS of activities that will help your students engage with learning about space. Below I’ll go into all of the amazing activities included in each product and what your students will get from it!
Passage
Students will start with a passage where they will learn more about the planet. This passage is short but full of great information that they will be able to use in the rest of the activities! These short passages are perfect for keeping your students’ attention while also helping you integrate some language arts standards. For students who may not be able to read on level, you can always have them read in partnerships or even record yourself reading it and then have them follow along!
Illustrate It
This activity allows students to draw both the outside and the inside of the planet. Art is a great way to help students remember, and they love it! This activity can be used either digitally, or it is easy to print out if you prefer that. If you do decide to have students draw digitally, I recommend a short lesson on the tools they can use beforehand. This way you won’t be baragged with a million questions. If you have reluctant artists, remind them that their drawings don’t need to be perfect and maybe allow them to look at a picture while drawing.
Watch It
Students love videos, and we love videos that teach! These videos are about 10 minutes long and perfect for 5th graders! They are entertaining with a lot of great information. To help students focus on what they’re learning they have a 3-2-1 activity sheet. Here they will write three facts, two questions, and one thing they found interesting. This will help make the video relevant and is also a great way for you to check for student questions. This is also a great activity that can be done whole class!
Write It Out
I love this activity because it gives students choice! Students will choose between two writing prompts about the planet where they are explaining to a friend. This is also awesome because studies have shown that students solidify information when they teach or tell it to someone else. To make this even more fun, when students are finished, have them share their writing with a friend in the class or even with someone who really doesn’t know about the planet! This assignment is easy to do both digitally or on paper making it super versatile.
Planets and Space Project Cube
This is a paper activity that is awesome to have students show you what they have learned! On this project cube, students will show their knowledge on planets, the Moon, the Sun, and galaxies! They will color, label, and write what they know about space. This is a super fun activity that students love and is a great formative assessment for you!
Digital Centers
This one is honestly my favorite! It includes everything listed above and more! Students also have a research center where they will do research on the planet and a creative center where they create their own story about the planet! It also includes true and false questions and definition matching at the end. Best of all, it has everything already set up for you in Google Slides! Just assign it and go!
Forms Quiz
This digital quiz has ten questions based on the reading passage. It is in Google Forms so it is completely self-grading! This is another great way to integrate language standards into your science unit and can even be used for test prep!
Bundle Up
Want all of these amazing resources? You can get all four of them in my Science Centers Growing Bundle along with some other amazing science centers! The best part of these digital space activities for 5th grade, is they are completely adaptable to work for YOU! You can use them in SO many different ways that I’m sure they will make your teaching life easier. Click the links below to access all of these space centers for your classroom!
