Matched to HS-ESS1-4 (motion of orbiting objects, including human-made satellites), HS-PS2-4 (Newton's law of gravitation), HS-ESS1-1 (the Sun's life span and nuclear fusion) and HS-ETS1-1 (global engineering challenges).
Curriculum links last reviewed November 2026.
Every tracked satellite in orbit, moving live.
predict the motion of human-made satellites with Newton's and Kepler's laws.
Compare a satellite in low orbit with a GPS satellite. Use Kepler's third law to predict the GPS period from the low one, then check.
Orbit details for thousands of satellites: height, period and inclination.
test Kepler's third law (T squared is proportional to r cubed) on real satellites, and use Newton's law of gravitation to work out the strength of gravity at each height.
Take five satellites at different heights. Plot period squared against orbit radius cubed (add 6,371 km to each height).
A live 3D globe of our nearest star.
use a model to explain how energy from nuclear fusion in the Sun's core reaches Earth as radiation, and how long the Sun will last.
Start with the globe, then discuss: where does the energy we see come from, and how long will it last?
Where the tracked junk in orbit is, and how crowded each height has become.
analyze space debris as a global engineering challenge, with criteria and constraints.
Teams pick one clean-up idea from the debris removal guide and list its criteria and constraints.
These are our suggestions for where each tool fits. Always preview a page before using it with a class: some tools show ads, these school pages do not.
NGSS codes are shown as performance expectations, for example MS-ESS1-1.
Know a better fit for your year group, or a topic we have missed? Tell us and we will add it.
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Orbital Radar. (2026, November 4). High school: orbits and gravitation. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high
“High school: orbits and gravitation.” Orbital Radar, 4 Nov. 2026, orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high. Accessed 4 Nov. 2026.
Orbital Radar (2026) High school: orbits and gravitation. Available at: https://orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high (Accessed: 4 November 2026).
Orbital Radar. “High school: orbits and gravitation.” Last modified November 4, 2026. https://orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high.
@misc{orbitalradar_schools_us_high,
author = {{Orbital Radar}},
title = {High school: orbits and gravitation},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
howpublished = {\url{https://orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high}},
url = {https://orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high},
urldate = {2026-11-04},
note = {Accessed 2026-11-04}
}TY - ELEC AU - Orbital Radar, TI - High school: orbits and gravitation PY - 2026 DA - 2026/11/04 PB - Orbital Radar UR - https://orbitalradar.com/schools/us/high Y2 - 2026/11/04 LA - en-US ER -
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