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A printable worksheet for the lesson Asteroids: the parent bodies (Start here: Explorer). It prints on A4 without the website around it. The answers are on a separate sheet for the teacher.

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Start here: Explorer · Ages 10 and upHowardites worksheet

Asteroids: the parent bodies

Name:Class:Date:

Key words

Meteorite
A meteorite is a piece of space rock that has survived its fall through the air and landed on Earth.
Asteroid
A rocky or metal-rich object, smaller than a planet, that goes around the Sun.
Protoplanetary disc
A flattened, spinning disc of gas and dust around a young star, where planets form.
Planetesimal
One of the countless small bodies, from about a kilometre to a few hundred kilometres across, that collided and merged to build the planets.
Jupiter
Jupiter is the largest planet in the Solar System, whose gravity shapes the asteroid belt and steers meteoroids towards Earth.
Orbit
An orbit is the curved path one object follows around another under gravity, such as Earth around the Sun.

Choose the right answer

Circle the letter of the right answer.

  1. What was the protoplanetary disc?
    • AA ring of ice and rock that circled the young Jupiter
    • BThe ring of asteroids that we see between Mars and Jupiter
    • CA flat, spinning disc of gas and dust around the young Sun
    • DA cloud of stardust far beyond the outermost planets
  2. Why does the Yarkovsky effect matter for meteorite delivery?
    • AIt slowly drifts fragments into resonances
    • BIt breaks large asteroids apart
    • CIt melts fragments into metal
    • DIt pushes fragments straight to Earth in days
  3. What is the total mass of the whole asteroid belt?
    • AAbout half the mass of our Moon
    • BAbout three times the mass of Earth
    • COnly about 3 per cent of our Moon's mass
    • DAbout the same as Jupiter's mass
  4. Which planet separated into a metal core and rocky layers in the same way?
    • AJupiter
    • BSaturn
    • CEarth
    • DNeptune
  5. In the marble activity, what do the small, repeated puffs of air at the same point stand for?
    • AJupiter's regular tugs in a resonance
    • BThe air braking a falling meteorite
    • CThe heat that melts an asteroid
    • DThe collision that breaks an asteroid

True or false?

Is the answer given right? Tick True or False.

  1. Which order shows how planets were built?

    Answer given: Dust, planetesimals, pebbles, planets TrueFalse

  2. About how many different parent bodies are thought to be sampled by known meteorites?

    Answer given: More than a hundred TrueFalse

Write your answer

Answer in a word or a short sentence.

  1. Which meteorites come from the cores of melted asteroids?
  2. In a melted asteroid, where did the metal go?
  3. Why is a resonance like pushing a child on a swing?

Task

Roll a marble across a table and gently blow on it from the side at the same point each time it passes. Notice how small, repeated pushes can change its path a lot. This is a rough model of how resonances work.

Howardites · free to copy for use in your classroom · answers are on the separate teacher's answer sheet