Teaching overview
Learning points
- Asteroids are rocky objects that orbit the Sun, and there are millions of them in our solar system.
- If an asteroid has an orbit that brings it close to Earth, it’s called a Near Earth Object.
- Powerful telescopes are used to identify and track Near Earth Objects. Hundreds of new asteroids are discovered every year.
Curriculum keywords
- Space
- Solar system
Read the story
An asteroid the size of a multi-storey building zoomed by Earth last week, just two days after it was first discovered. The asteroid, named 2017 AG13, passed within 200,000 kilometres of our planet – that’s closer than the Moon!
Share with students
Spark a discussion
- What is the asteroid belt, and where is it located?
- What are Near Earth Objects, and why is it important to find and track them?
- What happened at Chelyabinsk in 2013?
Twig Science: A Complete Pre-K–8 Program for the NGSS
Immersive Investigations with High-Quality Multimedia
- Investigating, designing, building, and understanding phenomena
- Hands-on, digital, video, and print investigations
- Synchronous/asynchronous distance learning