Hey Mr. Brown, What Do We Call Pluto Now?

Dwarf planets in our solar system? Pretty exciting!

While I was excited by the changes, I wondered how my students would react. Teaching science to students from 4th to 8th grade gave me a chance to see a range of reactions.

Throughout the classes, there was much discussion about Pluto being “demoted.” There’s only one thing demotion means in school, and it’s not good.

The reclassifying of Pluto was controversial for many of my younger students. Out of all the planets in our solar system, most of my 4th and 5th graders had a special attraction to Pluto.

Many of them thought it was really named after Mickey Mouse’s dog, and even if is wasn’t, Pluto was a name they could identify with. They didn’t know that in 1930, an 11-year old girl actually chose the name, inspired by the initials of Percival Lowell, the man who predicted the discovery of our ninth planet.

For my middle-school science students, the decision that planets had to meet specific criteria (orbit around the Sun, be large enough that it takes on a nearly round shape, and be able to clear its orbit of other objects) made sense.

Most of them understood that without criteria for calling a planet a planet, our solar system was going to change dramatically, perhaps 50 new planets being named.

I think quite a few of my students were excited that the solar system was alive with change—a reminder that new discoveries were being made, during their lifetime.

The question I was asked most often by all the science classes was what Pluto should be called now. Dwarf planet Pluto? Dwarf Pluto? Nothing clicked.

Several proposed that since Pluto had been called a planet for so long, it should just be allowed to keep the title—sort of “grandfathered” in.

What was the reaction in your classroom?