Happy Perihelion
On January 3, 2011, Earth will be as close as it gets to the Sun during its orbit. Students become familiar with the terms perihelion and aphelion as they calculate 1 AU and the perihelion distance in miles and kilometers, decide how much closer we will be to the Sun on January 3rd, 2011 then on July 4th, 2011, and figure out how long it will take to get to the sun leaving now in a school bus, a car, an airplane, the space shuttle, or in an “n” miles per hour vehicle.
happy-perihelion.doc happy-perihelion.pdf
