How fast do you think a rocket needs to go in order to launch into orbit? A shuttle needs to go from 0 to 18,000 miles per hour to get to space! (This is 9 times faster than the speed of a rifle bullet!) While these paper straw rockets don't fly nearly as fast, we had a bunch of fun watching them zoom off. Give it a try and see how well your rockets fly!

As a busy parent, I’m trying to make the most of our creating time and have really focused on all aspects of the process: brainstorming, making a plan, following step by step instructions, and testing our designs. Now it’s time to put your brainstorming skills to use with a fun project: Glowing Planets.

My daughter loves outer space and planets and can name each planet, so we decided to make a fun solar system out of duct tape sheets!

Blast off into STEM learning with this astronaut starter kit! Build and launch a pair of model orbiter spaceships using the power of pumps. Paint a set of model planets, then construct a miniature solar system that really spins.

When you look up at the moon at night, it often looks like there are some grey areas and some white areas on the surface. The grey areas are called craters. Have you ever wondered how the moon's craters are formed? If the answer is yes, then this experiment is just right for you. Make your own moon surface with flour and oil and then drop meteorites (small rocks and pebbles) from varying heights to create your own craters!

Dive into kid-friendly chemistry with a set of planet-themed bath bombs you crafted yourself! Mix together citric acid, baking soda, cornstarch, and food coloring to make a variety of colorful bath bomb powders. Use a set of molds to shape the powders into multi-layered bath bombs inspired by the layers of the Earth.

Learn about the constellations in the night sky and then imagine and design your own! Play with gears and use them to engineer a model system of the Sun, Earth, and Moon.

For a long, long time, people thought that the Sun and all of the other planets revolved around the Earth. This was called the geocentric, or Earth-centered, model of the solar system. Of course, now we know that the Sun is the center of the solar system, not the Earth - the solar system is actually heliocentric, or Sun-centered.

But the geocentric and heliocentric models had something in common - astronomers used orreries to study them! An orrery is a mechanical model of the motion of the planets in our solar system. Try making your own orrery by downloading the printable here!

Water squirters work by pressurizing reservoirs of water with air. As you pump the squirter, it gradually adds air to the reservoir, increasing the pressure. When you pull the trigger, the pressure is allowed to release and a stream of water shoots out!

In this DIY project, we'll learn how to use the exact sample principles found in water squirters to launch a water rocket sky-high! Follow along with these simple steps and you'll be blasting off in no time.