A walk in the park?

Introduction.

Now that the event of virus lock-down is virtually with us on 20 March,

this won't happen. Even in a very large field (?).

I won't edit every line in the new context.

Three brave parents wanted. Imagine you will lead a subsequent group after its/your debut run. I will lead the first session.

This page is very long and shows a field exercise for about twelve children. It depends on the involvement of a leader who has tested the walk and a minimum of three adults who have been well-briefed.

The website author offers to be the leader as he will have set the session up. A maximum of three parents are invited to assist. There's no reason for a parent not to be the leader but she/he needs confidence on the grand scale. It's no walk in the park. If your provisional decision has been made to help, and read on.

If your provisional decision has been made to help, self-isolate and read on.

A lot of editing of the original text has been necessary. Different text size has been a problem.

The exercise on this page will give your brain exercise as well as your legs!

Plan ahead. Choose a very large field or a very long straight path.

The distance in the model adds up to 1,019 paces. A mile is 1,760 yards.
Take "paces" with a pinch of salt. A handful of children is involved. A solution is given later. (No. 12)

If you manage to read it in one go, take immediate restorative action!

The fact is that the planets are mighty small (universally speaking) and the distances between them are almost ridiculously large (solarly speaking). To make any representation with a scale that is true for the planets sizes and distances, we must go outdoors.

The following exercise could be called a Model, a Walk or a Happening. Since it is simple (!), it is suitable for all ages.

There is someone who will profitably take the planet-walk - - - you the leader, alone or with helpers.

Reading the following description is no substitute: you must go out and take the steps and look at the distances, if group-awe is to set in.

Now skim through for a while. Don't dwell on anything. Then make the decision to walk the walk - ie read it thoroughly. If you plan to use all this, you must do everything here to be of any use to anyone.

In time, collect a box of all this (sans poles). Calipers would be useful.

First, collect the objects you need. They are:

Sun - any ball, diameter c 8 inches

Mercury - a pinhead, diameter 0.03 inch - keep it on the pin

Venus - a peppercorn, diameter 0.08 inch

Earth - a second peppercorn

Mars - a second pinhead

Jupiter - a chestnut or a pecan, diameter 0.90 inch

Saturn - a hazelnut or an acorn, diameter 0.70 inch

Uranus - a peanut or coffee bean, diameter 0.30 inch

Neptune - a second peanut or coffee bean

Collect several of each except the ball. Keep them in tubs - - with good lids.
The items are best stuck to paper side-plates. Let the children do the prep.

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You may suspect it is easier to search out pebbles of the right sizes. But the advantage of distinct objects such as peanuts is that their rough sizes are remembered along with them. It does not matter if the peanut is not exactly .3 inch long; nor that it is not spherical.

A standard bowling ball happens to be just 8 inches wide, and makes a nice massive Sun, But it is too heavy. There are plenty of inflatable balls which are near enough in size.

The three pins must be stuck through cardboard plates, otherwise their heads will be virtually invisible. If you like, you can fasten the other planets onto cardboard plates.

5 With the children

The prep

Begin by spilling the objects out on a table and setting them in a row. Here is the moment to remind everyone of the number of planets -8- and their order--

Write MVEMJSUN on a flipchart or blackboard. Say it's a memory aid.

See if anyone can work it out.

My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nuts

The main theoretical aspect over, ask the children who would like to be Mercury then Venus etc.

Others can be carriers, notetakers etc.

6

The first astonishment is the contrast between the great round looming Sun and the tiny planets. (And note a proof of the difference between reading and seeing: if it were not for the picture, the figures such as "8 inches" and ".08 inch" would create little impression.) Look at the second peppercorn--our "huge" Earth--up beside the truly huge curve of the "Sun".

7
Having set out the objects with which the model is to be made, the next thing is to ask: "How much space do we need to make it?"

To arrive at the answer, we must introduce scale.
The peppercorn is the Earth we live on.
The Earth is eight thousand miles wide!
The peppercorn is eight hundredths of an inch wide.
What about the Sun? It is not far over eight hundred thousand miles wide. more
The ball representing it is eight inches wide. So, one inch in the model represents a hundred thousand miles in reality.
This means that one yard (36 inches) represents 3,600,000 miles. Take a pace: this distance across the floor is an enormous space-journey called "three million six hundred thousand miles."

8 Problems when the session is carried out in a hall etc.

What is the distance between the Earth and the Sun?

It is 93 million miles. In the model, this will be 26 yards.

This still may not mean much until you get one of the group to start at the side of the room and take 26 long paces.

He comes up against the opposite wall at about 15 if you are lucky!

Clearly, it will be necessary to go outside. Walk it before involving participants

9

It's best for the group to prepare all the items before the day.

While you are talking and introducing the idea of the model, it may be helpful (depending on the age of the audience) to build up on a blackboard something like this:

Earth's width 8,000 miles 8/100 inch

Sun's width 800,000 miles 8 inches

therefore scale is 100,000 miles 1 inch

3,600,000 miles 36 inches or 1 yard

Sun-Earth distance 93,000,000 miles 26 yards

(In our case, no.)

You will have found in advance a spot from which you can walk a thousand yards in something like a straight line. This may not be easy. Straightness of the course is not essential; nor do you have to be able to see one end of it from the other. Unlikely.

It's even more effective if there is a long, straight line, however.

You may have to "fold" it back on itself. It should be a unit that will make a good story afterwards like "All the way from the flagpole to the cricket pavillion!"

The last prep

It's better to use long, thick bamboos or something similar and measure out 10 yards. Incorporate "hinges" or carry duct tape.

Also plan to carry 3ft high bamboo etc stakes on which to staple the planets.

It's also best to use paper/cardboard plates with the "planet" stuck in place. Edit in your mind when you read " ..put down his/her card and pinhead". Same re "weighting them with a pebble if necessary". You don't need them.

on the day

Put the Sun ball down, and march away as follows. (After the first two planets, you will want to appoint someone else to do the actual pacing - call this person the "Spacecraft" or "Yard-crafter"-so that you are free to talk.)"

10 yards. Call out "Mercury, where are you?" and have the Mercury-bearer put down his card and pinhead, see 12.

Another 9 yards. Venus puts down her peppercorn.

Another 7 yards. Earth

Already the thing seems beyond belief. Mercury is supposed to be so close to the Sun that it is merely a scorched rock, and we never see it except in the Sun's glare at dawn or dusk-yet here it is, utterly lost in space! As for the Earth, who can believe that the Sun could warm us if we are that far from it?

The correctness of the scale can be proved to sceptics (of a certain maturity) on the spot. The apparent size of the Sun ball, 26 yards away, is now the same as that of the real Sun-half a degree of arc, or half the width of your little finger held at arm's length. (If both the size of an object and its distance have been scaled down by the same factor, then the angle it portends must remain the same.)

Another 14 yards. Mars

Now come the gasps, at the first substantially larger leap:

Another 95 yards to Jupiter

Here is the "giant planet"-but it is a chestnut, more than a city large block of flats from its nearest neighbour in space!

From now on, amazement itself cannot keep pace, as the intervals grow extravagantly:

Another 112 yards. Saturn

Another 249 yards. Uranus

Another 281 yards. Neptune

You all have marched more than half a mile! (The distance in the model adds up to 1,019 paces. A mile is 1,760 yards.)

To do this, look back toward the Sun ball, which is no longer visible even with binoculars.

That is the outline of the Thousand-Yard Model. But be warned that if you do it once you may be asked to do it again.

So the outline can bear variation and elaboration. There are different things you can remark on during the yardings from one planet to the next, and there are extra pieces of information that can easily be grafted on.

I recommend that you stop reading at this point, carry out the walk once, and then read the further notes.

Follow-up

Having come to the end of the walk, you may turn your group around and retrace your steps. Re-counting the numbers gives a second chance to learn them, and looking for the little objects re-emphasises how lost they are in space. Ensure that large cards are used.

It works well, in this sense: everyone pays attention to the last few counts- "240...241...242"-wondering whether Neptune will come into view. But it does not work well if the peanut cannot be found, which is all too likely; so you should, if you plan to do this, place the objects on cards, or set markers beside them (large stones, or flags such as the pennants used on bicycles). No. 12 above is best!

Also, the Sun ball perhaps cannot be left by itself at the beginning of the walk, it might be carried off by a covetous person if not by the wind, so send someone back for it when the walk has progressed as far as Mars.

On each card, the group-member who recovers it may write briefly the place where it was-"At the goal post," ...etc. Then, at home, the objects are kept in a Tupperware etc box on a shelf, as a reminder of the walk. Or they may be hung on strings from a rafter. Keep notes of how each event went.

Since pecans, pinheads, peanuts, and especially peppercorns cannot always be readily found when another demonstration is called for, I keep at least one other set in a suitable tub.

Some readers will know how to find the source of all this before a fair amount of editing took place. (If you don't know please see foot of page) Others may be fluent with the exercise. Please step forward.

Editing the original has taken ages hence for example "paces" now = yards defined by a 10ft pole.

When you are ready

How's your VEM off for dripping? more

More info and source via another of my sites here

Ottwell, Guy. The Thousand Yard Model or the Earth as a Peppercorn. London: Universal Workshop, 1989 "A standard bowling ball happens to be just 8 inches wide, and makes a nice massive Sun, so I couldn't resist putting it in the picture." more

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