Stellar life cycles
KS4 · 35 minutes · Trace a star from nebula to remnant.
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Our learning goal
Trace a star from nebula to remnant.
Your turn: Choose one thing you would like to understand by the end.
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My lesson notes & project
Full teaching script
- Today: Stellar life cycles. Our goal: Trace a star from nebula to remnant.
- Take one idea at a time. Pause after each sentence; ask for repetition whenever you need it.
- A star is a balance: gravity squeezing inward, radiation pressure pushing outward. It ignites when a collapsing cloud's core reaches ~10 million K and hydrogen fuses to helium. It lives on the main sequence while that fuel lasts — a hot massive star burns out in millions of years, a red dwarf lasts trillions. When hydrogen runs low the core contracts, the shell swells to a red giant, and the ending depends on mass: below about 8 solar masses a planetary nebula and a white dwarf; above it a supernova leaving a neutron star or a black hole. Every atom heavier than iron in your body was forged in that violence.
- Together: choose one example from the explanation and show how it works. What do you notice?
- Your turn: Plot ten named stars on a Hertzsprung–Russell diagram and mark their fate.
- Reflect: what made sense, and what would you like explained differently?
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