Montana Student Wins Planets Mnemonic
By Joan Oleck -- School Library Journal, 2/25/2008 11:05:00 AM
Next time your students are trying to remember the names of the planets and "dwarf planets" in our solar system, try this mnemonic: "My Very Exciting Magic Carpet Just Sailed Under Nine Palace Elephants."
The first letter of each word in that sentence stands for Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Ceres, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Eris.
The mnemonic is the brainchild of 10-year-old Maryn Smith of Great Falls, MT, who won theNational Geographic Children's Books' contest, which invited kids to devise an easy way to memorize the celestial line-up that was revised last fall.
Pluto, remember, was voted off the planetary island in 2006 after 76 yeas of membership when the International Astronomical Union (IAU) dumped it from the celestial lineup. According to the IAU’s new official definition, Pluto meets only two of three requirements of a planet. Yes, it has sufficient self-gravity to give it a round shape. Yes, it revolves around a star. But it hasn't "cleared the neighborhood" around its orbit—its oblong path crosses Neptune's.
With the number of planets reduced by one, young astronomers had the need for a new mnemonic. Hence the contest. Maryn's mnemonic was chosen from 1,000 entries. Her prize? Her memory device will be enshrined in the upcoming National Geographic book Planets, Stars, and Galaxies: A Visual Encyclopedia of Our Universe, to be published next fall by astronomer David Aguilar.
Probably just as gratifying to Maryn is the fact that Grammy-nominated singer Lisa Loeb has signed on to incorporate the Montana student's mnemonic into a song. So, sometime in the future, librarians and other educators struggling to remember the planets (and dwarf planets) can either speak the memory device—or sing it.
