Something that I find interesting is what the moons are name after.

Mars of course is the God of War, and Mars moons are Phobos and Deimos. From what I know Phobos is a refrence to "Fear" which is what you have when you go to war. I cannot remember what Deimos is a refrence to.

Jupiter--all the moons except one-Amalthea--are named after the lovers of Zeus, the equivalent in Greek mythology of the Roman god Jupiter.

Saturn--The moons appear to be named after mythological characters. (There was no description in the book--Just a list of names).

Uranus--10 of the 17 moons were discovered by the voyager 2 probe in 1986. The moons are named after the characters in the writing of Shakespeare and Alexander Pope.

Neptune--6 of the 8 moons were discovered by Voyager 2 in 1989

Pluto--One theory about Charon's development says that it is made of ice from Pluto, knocked off when Pluto collided with another object. (again no description of what it is named after).

I got this infomation from "Space Encyclopedia" by Heather Couper and Nigel Henbest published by DK.


I work with the education program at my work and we often have scouts in earning their badges. The younger ones have to learn about the solar system, and we do a fun activity that involves making a necklace with beads of various sizes and colors--representing the planets, and use small plastic beads (the kind that kids play with all the time) as spacers between the planet beads.

If you would like to know how many spacers we place between the planets and a general description of the planet beads, let me know and I will try to get the instructions from work.