Tag: Education Point of Interest

Hobgood Students Walk to the Moon

Sixth-grade mathematics and science teacher and NASA Explorer Schools educator Chick Knitter and the staff of Hobgood Elementary School in Murfreesboro, Tenn., have developed a unique and exciting challenge for their 400 students — walk to the moon!

The students’ challenge is to walk 235,000 miles collectively, the distance from Earth to the moon. The staff tallies all students’ laps around the school’s quarter-mile track. To “get to the moon,” students will need to complete one million laps. The updates on miles are given weekly on the school’s TV webcast as well as a monthly “Moon Fact.”

The school had a kick-off for the Walk to the Moon Challenge this fall with Dr. Rhea Seddon. She is a former astronaut who lives in the area and is serving as the Grand Marshall. They hope to finish with the challenge by the end of the school year but will continue until they reach their “lofty” goal. Seddon plans to return to the school when the challenge is near completion and walk the last mile for the school as part of the closing ceremony. 

This challenge encourages students to stay healthy as well as learn about NASA, space and reaching their goals. What a great idea!



NASA Now: EPOXI Flyby Spacecraft: Close Encounters of the Comet Kind

NASA Now program logoIn this installment of NASA Now, you’ll meet spacecraft pilot and engineer Steven Wissler, who talks about the challenges of flying a spacecraft remotely from Earth and the excitement of being part of a team that discovers something new about comets.
 
The program focus is on the EPOXI flyby spacecraft. EPOXI is a recycling of the Deep Impact spacecraft, whose probe intentionally collided with comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005, revealing, for the first time, the inner material of a comet. Deep Impact returned to an Earth orbit where it was reprogrammed to rendezvous with a second comet, Hartley 2. After reprogramming, the spacecraft received a gravity assist from Earth and began its second life, dubbed EPOXI. The spacecraft incorporated the same trio of instruments used during the Deep Impact mission: two telescopes with digital imagers to record the encounter, and an infrared spectrometer.



Link to this NASA Now episode (must be logged into the NES Virtual Campus)


Link to other NASA Now events (must be logged into the NES Virtual Campus)




Youngest Ever Nearby Black Hole Discovered

Composite image shows a supernova within galaxy M100Astronomers using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory have found evidence of the youngest black hole known to exist in our cosmic neighborhood. The 30-year-old object provides a unique opportunity to watch a black hole develop from infancy.

The black hole is a remnant of SN 1979C, a supernova in the galaxy M100 approximately 50 million light years from Earth. Data from Chandra, NASA’s Swift satellite, the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton and the German ROSAT observatory revealed a bright source of X-rays that has remained steady during observation from 1995 to 2007. This suggests the object is a black hole being fed either by material falling into it from the supernova or a binary companion.

Excerpt from NASA Science News

For more information and images, visit the Chandra page.

Link to the Dec 14, 2010 NES chat with Black Holes expert, Dr. Sten Odenwald, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

Link to NES module, Black Holes Math. (Must be logged into the NES Virtual Campus as a participant of the NES project)

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.

DLiNFocus: NASA Careers ‘What’s in Your Future?’ Special Event Series

Students and teachers have an opportunity to learn about the wide variety of career choices at NASA — astronauts aren’t the only folks who work at NASA! NASA employees representing various projects and missions will be in the Digital Learning Network studios for a series of webcasts focusing on careers. They will share their academic experiences from elementary school through college and talk about what motivated them to pursue their careers.


 Each event will be webcast to allow students from all over the world to watch the interviews. Any student can interact by sending questions via e-mail.


The schedule of events through December is:

 — Dec. 1: Marshall Space Flight Center featuring Tristan Curry — Aerospace Engineer. 
 — Dec. 8: Dryden Flight Research Center featuring Kathleen Stanton — Nurse.
 — Dec. 15: Glenn Research Center featuring Mike Foreman — former astronaut and current Chief of External Programs at GRC. 

Each hour-long webcast event begins at 2 p.m. EST.

Sign up today to become a part of this exciting opportunity to meet NASA employees live!

For more information, visit the DLN website at http://dln.nasa.gov and click the Special Events button.

Inquiries about the DLiNFocus series should be directed to Caryn Long.



Operation IceBridge Web Chat with Project Scientists

Sun setting over the Antarctic

On Thursday, Nov. 18, IceBridge scientists will be on hand from the field to answer your questions about the mission. Joining the chat is easy. Simply visit this page on Thursday, Nov. 18, from 1 to 2 p.m. EST. The chat window will open at the bottom of this page starting at 12:30 p.m. EST. You can log in and be ready to ask questions at 1 p.m. The time and date is subject to change due to changes in the flight schedule to meet requirements for good weather over science targets.


Link to the IceBridge Mission page.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus.


Want to Go to Mars? Here's Your Chance.

Artist concept of the mars science laboratory rover on MarsSomeday YOU may one of the people to walk around on Mars. That’s some day in the future — way in the future. But here’s your chance to have a presence on Mars soon! Send your name to Mars! Your name will be included with others on a microchip attached to the rover, Curiosity. Launch is scheduled for between Nov. 25 and Dec. 18, 2011, with a Martian arrival date of August 2012.

How cool is that?

To send your name to Mars, sign-up at the registration website.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus website.

LCROSS Results — Back-to-School Special

artist concept of LCROSS in spaceIt’s been a year since LCROSS heroically impacted the moon in search of water. The results of analysis of the impact of LCROSS on the moon have been in the news recently. You may have seen pieces on the news or read about water being discovered on the moon.

On Wednesday, Nov. 3, your students will have a front row seat as Principal Investigator Tony Colaprete and Co-Investigator Jen Heldmann reveal their surprising and exciting findings! You’ll have the chance to ask questions and hear these scientists answer them directly during a 50-minute webcast.

There are two scheduled opportunities on Wednesday, Nov. 3 — 

10 a.m. PDT / 1 p.m. EDT and 1 p.m. PDT / 4 p.m. EDT



Don’t be left out of participating in this unique opportunity. Check your ability to connect to the webcast by going to the “how to” page.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus website.


Expedition 27 and 28 Downlink Opportunity

Call for Proposals: NASA is seeking formal and informal education institutions and organizations, individually or working together, to host a live, in-flight education downlink during Expeditions 27 and 28 (approximately from March to September). To maximize these downlink opportunities, NASA is looking for organizations that will draw large numbers of participants and integrate the downlink into a well-developed education plan. The deadline to submit a proposal is Dec. 3, 2010.

Opportunity: During Expeditions 27 and 28, crew members aboard the International Space Station will participate in downlinks. Downlinks are approximately 20 minutes in length and allow students and educators to interact with the astronauts through a question and answer session. A downlink is a modified video conference in which participants see and hear the crew members live from space, but the crew does not see the audience. Downlinks afford education audiences the opportunity to learn firsthand from astronauts what it is like to live and work in space. Downlinks are broadcast live on NASA TV and are streamed on the NASA website. Because of the nature of human spaceflight, organizations must demonstrate the flexibility to accommodate changes in downlink dates and times.

Interested parties should contact Teaching From Space to obtain information related to expectations, content, format, audience, application guidelines and forms by sending an e-mail to JSC-Teaching-From-Space@mail.nasa.gov or calling 281-244-7608.



Forest Lake Elementary Technology Magnet School featured on NBC Nightly News


Forest Lake Elementary Technology Magnet School (Columbia, South Carolina), a NASA Explorer Schools project participant since 2006, was featured on the “NBC Nightly News” on Oct. 1 as part of a week-long series on trends and innovation in education. The team at Forest Lake has won numerous accolades for turning the school’s performance around by using innovative teaching methods. The staff credits the NES project as one of their main catalysts.

View the video clip.

Link to the NASA Explorer Schools Virtual Campus website.

NASA Endeavor Science Teaching Certificate Project: K-12 Educator Fellowships


As part of NASA’s commitment to the effective preparation of science teachers, educators are invited to apply to become a NASA Endeavor Fellow. Each fellow is fully funded to complete five graduate courses in an innovative, online format. In these courses, participants learn to apply research-based pedagogical strategies and cutting-edge STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) content to their classroom. Applications for Cohort 3 will be accepted through Oct. 15, 2010.



Link to the NASA Explorer Schools Virtual Campus website.