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Level-graded English lessons with reading, listening, activities, and discussion.

Lesson Info

Type
Explainer
Level
2 / A2
Published
Title
What Is a Planet?
Webpage
https://eslnewsstories.com/explainers/what-is-a-planet/

Lesson Content

Look First, Words You Need, Read and Listen

Understanding: Understand It

Chunks: Place, Repeat

Use It

Answers

What Is a Planet?

Level 2 Explainer

Start Here

Look First

A large Earth-like planet fills the foreground, with a rocky red planet, a striped gas giant, a ringed planet, small moons, and the bright Sun farther away.
  1. What can you see in the picture?
  2. How are the planets different?
  3. Where is the light coming from?

Before You Read

Words You Need

Learn

Read and Listen

Play the audio while you read, or listen after you read.

Some planets look like bright stars in the night sky, but planets and stars are different. A planet is a large, round object in space. It moves around a star and does not make its own light.

Earth is a planet. It moves around the Sun, which is a star. Seven other planets also move around the Sun. These eight planets are part of our Solar System.

Planets can be very different. Some are small and rocky, like Earth and Mars. Others are much larger and are mostly made of gas. Some planets have rings, and many have moons.

Earth is the planet we know best because it is our home. The other planets in our Solar System are very different from Earth, but they are all planets because they move around the Sun.

Quick Check

Understand It

  1. Planets make their own light.
  2. Eight planets move around the Sun.
  3. Some planets have rings.
  4. What is the Sun?
  5. What have scientists found around other stars?

Build

Chunks

Place

  1. Earth and Mars .

  2. Jupiter .

  3. Saturn .

  4. A moon .

is much larger than Earth has rings around it moves around a planet have rocky surfaces
Earth and Mars shown as rocky planets, Jupiter much larger than Earth, Saturn with large rings, and a moon moving around a planet.

Repeat

Listen and Repeat. Hide the text and try again.

rocky surfaces
Earth and Mars have rocky surfaces.
much larger than Earth
Jupiter is much larger than Earth.
rings around it
Saturn has rings around it.
move around the Sun
The planets move around the Sun.

Now Try

Use It

Talk or write. Use the language from this lesson.

Supported output: A planet is...
Supported output: A planet does not...
Supported output: The planets in our Solar System...
Recycle language: What can you see in the night sky?
Extend topic: Which planet do you think is most interesting? Why?
Extend topic: What makes Earth different from other planets you know about?
Extend topic: Do you think people will live on another planet one day? Why or why not?

Answers What Is a Planet? / Level 2

Understand It:

  1. False
  2. True
  3. True
  4. a star
  5. many planets

Chunks: Place:

  1. Earth and Mars have rocky surfaces.
  2. Jupiter is much larger than Earth.
  3. Saturn has rings around it.
  4. A moon moves around a planet.

KEEP GOING

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Lesson by Aron Thode Reviewed

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