Imagine Earth Artifacts
Recommended For: Ages 7 and up
Badges: Space & the Future, Space Museum
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Download this activity as a PDF - no electricty required.
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Imagine that you are in the future. It is now the year 4000 AD. You are an alien archaeologist. Your spaceship has crash landed on the planet once called Earth. You find a stone building that says Jewish Museum of Maryland and wonder around it. As an alien archaeologist, you are tasked with learning about life on other planets by investigating the objects that you find there.
In this activity, you have come across some objects that you have never seen before. Your task is to make observations, record your data, and send your report back to your home planet.
What You Need
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Paper
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Pencil
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Photo of an object - select from the photos below. After you complete investigating one object, you can return to look at more.
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Notice
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First, see what you can learn about the object from looking at it.
How big is it? What does it appear to be made of?
Then, explore the visual and design elements.
What colors do you see? What textures do you see? What lines do you see?
Use your imagination:
Does it have a smell? What do you think it smells like?
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Tip: When making observations, it is helpful to start at one side of the object and move to the other side. Or you can talk about things in the order to which they draw your eye. What did you see first? What did you notice next?
With every observation that you notice, ask yourself “how do I know this?”
Wonder
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We can’t learn everything about an object just by looking at it. Think about what questions you still wonder about the object.
Does this object remind me of any other objects that I have seen before?
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Record
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Write down your observations.
Write down the questions you still have.
Create
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Create a report that explains what your object is. Remember you are from the future and don't know what the original purpose of theobject was. Use your imagination. There is no correct answer. Be creative! Be funny! Be clever!
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Wonderlog
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Want to complete this task towards collecting a Wondernaut badge? Share your report on the object you selected with the Wondernaut community. Gold stars for the most creative report on what the object might be!
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Interested in learning about what these objects really are and what they were used for? Come visit our Voices of Lombard Street exhibit!
