Pluto

Eric Rudy

Guess what? Pluto is now considered a dwarf planet. Pluto is not the only dwarf planet. Ceres and Eris are the other dwarf planets. Pluto is not like the other outer planets because Pluto has an icy and rocky surface where the others are made of gases. Can you believe that Pluto is only 1,422 miles wide? That’s about the distance of New York to New Jersey. Pluto is the coldest planet in the solar system because its surface is about -365 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s very cold!

Pluto is 2,700,000,000 miles from the sun. That’s far, but Pluto is not the farthest. Eris, another dwarf planet, is the farthest from the Sun. It takes 248 years for Pluto to orbit the Sun. Imagine if you were on Pluto. It would be a long time before you would have a birthday! A day on Pluto takes 6 Earth days and 9 hours to rotate. That’s a very long time.

Pluto has three moons called Caron, Nix, and Hydra. They are still discovering more moons! Did you now Caron is the closest to Pluto? They think Pluto is making more moons. Isn’t that a cool fact to learn?

Do you believe Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto in 1930? That’s only 79 years before 2009. That’s not very long ago. I can’t believe that Pluto is smaller then the Earth’s moon! That’s kind of scary and small. I bet you didn’t now that Pluto was named after the Roman god of the underworld. That’s why Pluto is a good planet to study.

The end

Bibliography

Internet site: http://kids.nineplanets.org/

www.nationalgeographic.com

Book: Pluto A Dwarf Planet; Christine Taylor-Butler