Month: June 2011

Building and Dropping Mars Landers — Six Minutes of Terror

Cartoon: Shuttle orbiting Earth

Students in Donna Rand’s class at East Hartford-Glastonbury Elementary Magnet School conducted an activity called Building & Dropping Mars Landers — 6 Minutes of Terror. To introduce the activity, students watched the NASA video “Six Minutes of Terror.” Rand’s fourth-grade students worked in teams to design and build Mars landers that contained a glass ornament payload. The landers were dropped from the gym ceiling. The goal of the activity was to deliver the ornament safely to the gym floor.


This activity is now a part of Rand’s Force and Motion science unit. 

For pictures and video go to the “Six Minutes of Terror” article in NEON. 


Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.



NASA Summer of Innovation Mini Grants – Second Opportunity

The NASA Office of Education is offering a second opportunity for Summer of Innovation, or SoI, Mini-Grants in partnership with the National Space Grant Foundation. The mini-grant aspect of the SoI enables local organizations to infuse NASA-themed science, technology, engineering and mathematics content and activities to middle school students through existing summer and/or afterschool programs. 
 
Organizations are eligible to apply for up to $2,500 in funding to incorporate SoI content and themes into their programming.

The application deadline is June 17, 2011 with an anticipated award announcement date of July 1, 2011.  
 
For eligibility, timeline and application information, please see the SoI Mini-Grant page on the Space Grant Foundation web site.
 
Find answers to Frequently Asked Questions or for more information about this exciting opportunity here.
 

The SoI Mini- Grant Program anticipates making approximately 200 awards during the 2011 fiscal year.