The Field Museum owns materials older than our sun—can you believe that? An enlightening video displays and discusses some of these. It explains where they come from, how they formed, how they survived this long, and what we know about them. The video also presents nanodiamonds found in meteorites and is part of a playlist from Brain Scoop on Fossils and Geology.

Concepts

the solar system, stars, astronomy, diamonds

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Additional Tags

science

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Instructional Ideas

• If possible, visit the Field Museum
• Research the dating techniques used to determine the age of the minerals

Classroom Considerations

• Relies on prior knowledge of the life cycle of stars

• This video is hosted on YouTube

Pros

• Provides closed captioning in eight languages for ELLs
• Displays actual star stuff (a term coined by Carl Sagan), and it turns out it is made from diamonds

Cons

• None

Common Core

SL.6.2 SL.7.2 SL.8.2 SL.9-10.2 SL.11-12.2 RST.6-8.4 RST.9-10.4 RST.11-12.4