Welcome to another Wacky Workshops project, creating a galaxy of fun with paper plate spinning.

Space – the final frontier. It is filled with beauty, mystery and possibilities, leaving the door wide open for the imagination to run wild.

It’s no wonder then that galaxy pictures have been a favourite with Wacky Workshops students the past few years.

This fun paper plate spinning activity creates two beautiful galaxy projects.

 GALAXY OF FUN FACTS

• Did you know that space is completely silent? As there is no atmosphere in space, there is no way for sound to travel to be heard.
• There is also no atmosphere on the moon, so no wind or water to change the terrain. This means the footprints of astronauts and spacecraft prints will be there for millions of years.

• Everything in the solar system revolves around the sun. Of the eight planets that orbit the sun, Venus is the hottest, which is funny because it is not the closest planet to the sun – Mercury is.
• In order, going from the closest planet to the Sun, to the one that is farthest away, they are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.

• The biggest planet is Jupiter, which is made up of gas. It has an enormous storm, (it’s bigger than planet Earth) that has been blowing for hundreds of years and is called the Great Red Spot.
• Saturn is famous for having rings of small pieces of ice and dust around it. Like Jupiter, it is made of gas and is much bigger than Earth.
• The smallest planet is Mercury
• The Moon is a ball of rock that orbits around the Earth, in the same way that the Earth orbits around the Sun. Other planets have moons too. Jupiter has at least 66 of them!

SPACE AND TIME

Time, as we know it, is very different in space as well.

I remember viewing stars that had died thousands of years before, through a large telescope. How is this possible? When viewing stars through a telescope, we can see those that are many billions of light-years away. It is believed stars live for around a billion years. While the speed of light is incredibly fast, even light from the closest stars takes years to get to us. Therefore, it’s possible to see the light of a star, through a telescope, which has died many years before.

Time is different for the planets too. One day on Venus is longer than one year.

Venus has a slow axis rotation which takes 243 Earth days to complete its day. The orbit of Venus around the Sun is 225 Earth days, making a year on Venus 18 days less than a day on Venus.

CREATE A GALAXY OF FUN ART PROJECT

Paper plate spinning is such a fun activity for kids and doesn’t require many materials.

In fact, all you need are some different coloured paints, paper plates and black cardboard.

There is no need for brushes as the paint is placed in little puddles on the paper plate. You can use a plastic spoon or craft stick to do this.

You may want to cut the plates to represent the different sizes of the planets.

Simply put the paint on the plate and help the child flip it onto their cardboard canvas. Then they push down on the plate and spin it around, which blends the colours and creates a circle. Make sure they push down around the circumference of the plate to create a lovely circle.

If they spin too much (it’s hard not to as it’s lots of fun) the colours will blend too much and you may end up with a brown mess.

CREATE A GALAXY OF FUN MOBILE PROJECT

Ask any Wacky Workshops student what I hate most and they’ll tell you ”waste”. Therefore, it would be a real shame to throw out the beautifully coloured plates once you’ve finished the artwork.

They make a beautiful planet mobile when attached to a wire ring with fishing line. Sadly, I didn’t take any pictures of my students’ mobiles.

You can make your own wire ring by wrapping the wire around a large bowl and twisting the ends together.

Then punch a hole in the paper plate planets and tie a fishing line through the hole and attach the other end to the wire.

Use some of the offcuts from your plates to create Saturn’s ring and glue it into place.

Check out my 5 Fun and Easy Space Themed Crafts for more inspiration.

Follow me on Pinterest for more fun arts and crafts for kids.

Happy crafting and have a gleeful week, Tamuria.