Model of the Moon – Science Fair Project

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of FloraCraft® Make It: Fun® Foam. All ideas, opinions and photos are all my own. This post contains affiliate links.

It’s that time of year where the kids are coming home from school and announcing that they have a science project due.  I actually love these kinds of projects because they encourage kids to think outside the box and be creative.  As a creative person this is where I thrived in school and I’m learning that my kids love these kind of projects too.  This month FloraCraft® Make It: Fun® Foam challenged me to create an educational project and the timing couldn’t have been better!  Inspired by my daughter’s love of space we created a model of the moon for her science fair project.

From a very young age our oldest daughter has been fascinated with all things space.  She has always been curious about what is out there and why it looks the way it does.  So naturally when it came time for her to pick a science fair project she knew she wanted to do something on space.  After lots of discussion she picked the moon as her focus and set out to explain the answers to the questions “Why are there craters on the moon?” 

One of the things she learned was that the moon is more susceptible to craters from space rocks than Earth. Earth’s atmosphere will burn most meteorites and asteroids before they come in contact with Earth’s surface. The moon, however, does not have an atmosphere to protect it.  She also learned that caters larger than about 10 kilometers across often have central peaks, which are hills or mountains pushed up by pressure within the Moon when the weight of the rocks that were blasted away was removed. Not all craters are large circular pits like we often see in photos.  In addition to all of her great research we thought it would be great to have a 3D model of the moon to illustrate her information and findings. 

What You Will Need:

• 10″ FloraCraft® Make It: Fun® Foam ball
• Disposable cups and bowl
• Smooth Finish
• StyroGlue® or low-temp hot glue gun
• White, silver and gray craft paint
• Paintbrush

Step 1:

Use the end of a paint brush to poke random holes in the ball.  These will help you create some of the smaller craters.

Step 2:

To form some of the larger craters cut the bottom part off of the cup or bowl.  Use StyroGlue®  glue or a low-temp glue gun to randomly place your craters around the ball.

Step 3: 

Now it’s time to smooth out the surface of your moon.  Use a spatula to smear the Smooth Finish all over your craters and the rest of the balls surface.  Don’t worry about it being perfectly smooth, after all this is supposed to resemble the surface of the moon which, as we learned, is not a smooth surface.

Step 4:

Once the Smooth Finish has completely dried sand off any super rough patches or areas that need more definition.  Now it’s time to paint the surface of your moon.  We started by using a dark gray and metallic silver to paint around each of the craters.

Step 5: 

Mix the white and gray paint to create a soft and subtle gray to paint the surface of your moon.  We looked at pictures of the moon and just tried to replicate the dark and light areas that saw around the craters.  If you feel like it is too dark in one area simply go over it with the white or light gray paint mixture.

Step 6: 

Cover a foam cube in black paper and paint a dowel rod black.  insert the 3D moon into the dowel rod and then insert that into the foam block to display your moon.

We used a black project board for my daughter’s project and the moon really popped off of it for the perfect dramatic space effect.  I love seeing my kids creativity as they work on these fun school projects.  She was so excited about all of the research she had done and learned, but she was even more excited to see it come to life in this creative and easy model of the moon craft.

What are your kids planning on doing for their science fair projects?