Curated OER
What's Out There? Space Shuttle Exploration and Simulation
Learners role-play the jobs of space shuttle astronauts, conduct experiments, and research space using the Internet and offline experiments. Student-astronauts hold a "press conference" to share their information with others in a...
PBS
Invisible Force
Investigate invisible forces. Young engineers design a setup that changes the direction of a steel ball using a magnetic force. The purpose of the setup is to model the gravitational pull of spacecraft by planetary bodies.
NASA
MASS, MASS – Who Has the MASS? Analyzing Tiny Samples
What is it worth to you? A hands-on instructional activity asks groups to collect weights of different combinations of coins and calculate weighted averages. They use the analysis to understand the concept of an isotope to finish the...
Curated OER
Discover Magazine: Size and Scale
High schoolers research measurements of the moon and Earth as well as the distance between the two in order to create scale models of the Earth-moon system. With a marble to be used as the moon, they must determine how large to make...
Curated OER
Planetary Poster
Students engage in a study about the planets and create a poster as one of the projects during the study. They create individual charts for mapping the solar system so the locations can be found in mock space missions to other planets.
Curated OER
Satellites
Eighth graders explore the history of space travel and satellites. Through a teacher demonstration, 8th graders observe how a satellite revolves another object. They identify natural and artificial satellites, explore how satellites...
Curated OER
From the Moon to the Sun and Back Again
Students consider the aims of the space program, create posters comparing the voyages of Apollo 17 and Genesis and write response papers evaluating NASA's current mission statement.
Curated OER
Exploring the Night Sky: Summer
Students explain how moon phases occur. They describe and explain at least two common misconceptions that people have about the moon. Students explain what a star is. They explain 3 ways that the night sky has been used throughout history.
Curated OER
Our Solar System - Comparing Planetary Travel Distances
NASA presents a mini-unit on distances in our solar system. It incorporates scientific concepts of gravity, mass, density, and payload while your aspiring astronauts also employ mathematics skills. They calculate speed, they determine...
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Gravity Launch
Getting a ship into orbit isn't rocket science. Oh, wait...that's exactly what it is! Learn the basics of the concepts of thrust, launch angle, and gravitational pull in this fun and progressively challenging game.
Curated OER
How Do We Explore Strange Environments?
Students identify and label the different parts of a robot, rover, or a spacecraft. They discuss and record all of the features their robot will need to accomplish its mission and be able to explain why they chose these features to...
Curated OER
"One Giant Leap for Mankind"
Young scholars explore the significance of the Apollo 11 lunar landing by interviewing an adult for memories of the mission. They incorporate their interviews into news articles as 'journalists' in July 1969 to document this historic...
Curated OER
Impact Craters: Holes in the Ground!
Students simulate crater formation through a lab activity. In this space science lesson, students calculate how much energy is transferred during meteorite impact. They identify different factors affecting the size and depth of craters...
Curated OER
Applying For The Mission
Learners participate in a live simulation of traveling through space as part of a large science unit. They are encouraged to go into the community and ask for participation from parents and relatives. Students reflect upon their own...
NASA
Beginning Engineering, Science, and Technology
Space, the Final Frontier. The nine NASA-created challenges in this unit are designed to teach class members the engineering design process. Each challenge comes with teacher and student pages that can be used individually or as a...
Florida International University
The Good, the Bad and the Nasty Tasting
Examine the benefits of chemical defense mechanisms. Organisms in oceans use chemicals to ward off predators. Duplicate this adaptation using a hands-on experiment in which you ward off your predators (your pupils) with some bad-tasting...
Curated OER
Cold War - The Space Race
In these Cold War worksheets, students read about the space race between the United States and Russia. Students also read about the first man on the moon and answer 8 questions about the texts.
Curated OER
Titan and the Other Moons of Saturn
Students identify and describe the moons of Saturn. They sort the moons by their characteristics. They write a paragraph describing the moons to end the instructional activity.
Curated OER
Exploration of the Moon
In this moon worksheet, students review the Clementine exploration of the Earth's moon. This worksheet has 8 matching and 14 true or false questions.
Curated OER
Exploring the Night Sky: Fall/Winter
Students explain how moon phases occur. They explain three ways that the night sky has been used through history. Students locate some of the constellations in the night sky. They discuss stories and myths surrounding stars.
Curated OER
Space Science: A Scoop of Moon Dirt
Students discover soil characteristics and how it is formed on Earth and the Moon by examining local samples to a lunar simulant. They replicate the effects of wind erosion by scraping dry bread with sandpaper. Students use rocks and...
Curated OER
Compound Interest
In this compound interest worksheet, students solve 3 problems after reading about compound interest. They determine the cost of the Apollo missions, they calculate inflation and the cost it would be to send man to the moon today and...
Curated OER
The Solar System
High schoolers examine the solar space program and research what options are the most viable. In this solar system instructional activity students view a video on the solar system, research the Internet and make recommendations.
Curated OER
Discover Magazine: The Solar System
Young scholars research ideas for NASA's space exploration. In this Space Science lesson plan, students will try to find a way to bring NASA back into the spot light. Young scholars will presented their ideas to the class for review.