What I Learned by Watching Children’s Reactions to a Space Fact
- Yolande Clark-Jackson
- 4 days ago
- 3 min read
The surprising thing I learned about the power of a reveal
On August 1, 2026, Rocko Rocket was a coLab community partner with The Orlando Science Center. Stationed between the dinosaur exhibit and the our planet space exhibit entrance, I encountered children of all ages. Some teenagers, some who watched from their strollers, and others who wanted to get close to the action and touch and feel their way through.
Our exhibit was about scale. Our example was a comparison between the moon and the sun.
Our question: How many moons could fit inside the sun?
No one guessed the correct answer. One person came close. And everyone was surprised by the actual number.
The space fact surprised everyone
I won’t give you the number here. I want you to guess first, the way every kid (and many adults) at that table did. (You can see one of the reactions in the video below.)
But I will tell you: I was surprised by what I saw on the other side of the reveal.
What surprised me more than any of the exhibits I saw at the center was what I learned about the joy in awe. I witnessed joy. Then I witnessed it over and over again. Each time I watched a reaction go from surprise to happiness. It made me happy too.
That reaction is the whole reason Rocko Rocket exists. Not to teach children a number, but to give a minute or two to allow the universe to get bigger than they thought, and to let them feel that in their body before anyone explains it to them.
"Rocko Rocket exists not to teach children a number, but to give a minute or two to allow the universe to get bigger than they thought."
We built this activation with vinyl image of the diameter of the sun and a string of silver beads. Nothing fancy. But it provided a tactile way to hold two impossible sizes in your head and hands at the same time. We included our Youtube video for the reveal.
And it worked on a clever four year old, a statistician who was there with his friend, and on a fourteen year old who’d already decided science class was boring. That’s the range I care about.
A few things I'm keeping with me:
There were times during the event where I wish I had a videographer on hand to capture each reaction so I could take them back with me and watch again and again. But since I can't do that, I took three lessons from the day that felt like universal truths.
Awe doesn’t need explaining. It needs a question good enough to make someone guess.
Kids will surprise you with how badly they want to be right, and how happily they’ll be wrong.
The best science communication isn’t about the fact. It’s about the moment right before you tell them the fact.
It you want to see the full reveal video and learn how many of our moons would fit inside our sun then check out our Think Space Kids series on Youtube and watch the full Youtube video. Watch until the end for the surprising space fact.
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