My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nachos.
Have you ever seen this mnemonic before?
A mnemonic is a learning technique that helps us to remember information. This sentence is used to memorise the order of the planets in our solar system. The key to this sentence is to look at the first letter of each word:
Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
The Solar System is made up of all the 8 planets that orbit our Sun. It can be split into the Inner and Outer Solar Systems. The Inner Solar System is the planets closest to the sun (Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars) and are called the terrestrial planets because the have rock surfaces. The Outer Solar System is made up of the gas giants: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune and are _1_.
The Sun is a star at the centre of our solar system, all 8 planets _2_ around it. Our Sun is one of about 100 billion stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way.
Mercury is the smallest and closest planet to the Sun. Mercury has been visited by two _3_ NASA space probes.
Venus is named after the Roman Goddess of love and beauty, but it's extremely hot and deadly atmosphere make it impossible for astronauts to visit.
Our planet's surface is 70% covered in water. Earth is the only planet to have water although Mars has past _4_ of it. Water makes the possibility of life much greater.
Mars, also known as the red planet due to it's bright rust colour, is home to _5_ the highest mountain and the deepest, longest valley in the solar system.
Jupiter is the largest planet with a diameter that is 11 times larger than Earth. The great red spot on Jupiter is a _6_ that has been going on for over 300 years.
Galileo was the first to observe Saturn with a _7_ in 1610. It is famous for its many rings which in the early 1980s NASA revealed were mostly water ice.
Like Jupiter and Saturn, Uranus is a gas giant. But Uranus is a little different. Unlike all the other planets and most of the moons in our Solar System, Uranus spins on its side. Its unusual position is thought to be the result of a _8_ with a planet-sized body early in the solar system's history.
Neptune, which is never visible with the naked-eye, is the _9_ planet. It is nearly 2.8 billion miles (4.5 billion kilometres) from the sun and orbits the sun once every 165 years!
Which missing words complete these facts about the planets:
