In this activity, students construct adding slide rules, scaled with linear calibrations like ordinary rulers. Students learn to move these scales relative to each other in ways that add and subtract distances, thus calculating sums and differences. This is Activity A1 in the "Far Out Math" educator's guide. Lessons within the guide include activities in which students measure, compare quantities as orders of magnitude, use scientific notation, and develop an understanding of exponents and logarithms using examples from NASA's GLAST mission. These are skills needed to understand the very large and very small quantities characteristic of astronomical observations. Note: In 2008, the GLAST mission was renamed Fermi, for the physicist Enrico Fermi.

This story, featuring a pigeon named Amelia, takes place in New York City. Amelia's owner, a young girl named Maria, receives a gift from her grandfather-a camera specially designed for strapping on to a pigeon along with copies of old photographs taken of New York City landmarks. Suddenly, Amelia's flights around the city take on new relevance; she visits the Bronx Zoo, Central Park and Battery Park to take updated pictures of those same landmarks from her "birds-eye" perspective. Through Amelia's adventures, and with some help from a NASA scientist, Maria learns about the history of aerial images, the use of images to detect changes over time, the significance of color, texture and shape in interpreting those images, and the importance of images taken from today's NASA satellites to our understanding of Earth.

Welcome to the exciting world of aeronautics. The term aeronautics originated in France, and was derived from the Greek words for “air” and “to sail.” It is the study of flight and the operation of aircraft. This educator guide explains basic aeronautical concepts, provides a background in the history of aviation, and sets them within the context of the flight environment (atmosphere, airports, and navigation).

The activities in this guide are designed to be uncomplicated and fun. They have been developed by NASA Aerospace Education Services Program specialists, who have successfully used them in countless workshops and student programs around the United States. The activities encourage students to explore the nature of flight, and experience some real-life applications of mathematics, science, and technology.

The subject of flight has a wonderful power to inspire learning.

This astronomy program is designed for middle school children in out-of-school-time settings. The program explores basic astronomy concepts (like invisible light, telescopes) and focuses on the universe outside the solar system (stars, galaxies, black holes). The program is structured for use in a variety of settings, including astronomy days, summer camps, or year-long afterschool programs. Although session activities build concepts sequentially, each session activity is designed to be freestanding as not all participants may attend every session. A manual provides background information and descriptions of how to conduct each activity. A companion website provides additional information and resources for the program leader.

This is a book containing over 200 problems spanning over 70 specific topic areas covered in a typical Algebra II course. Learners can encounter a selection of application problems featuring astronomy, earth science and space exploration, often with more than one example in a specific category. Learners will use mathematics to explore science topics related to a wide variety of NASA science and space exploration endeavors. Each problem or problem set is introduced with a brief paragraph about the underlying science, written in a simplified, non-technical jargon where possible. Problems are often presented as a multi-step or multi-part activities. This book can be found on the Space Math@NASA website.

Traditionally, spectral images are two dimensional, and related to text. This kinesthetic activity has groups of students position themselves along a printed spectrum to make spectral patterns and model various elements. Includes photos, teachers notes and instructions, related resources (e.g., color pdf of a visible light spectra image that can be projected onto a white board or wall to do the activity), and alternative suggestions.

This experimental activity is designed to develop basic understanding of the relationship between the angle of light rays and the area over which the light rays are distributed, and the potential to affect changes in the temperature of materials. Resources needed to conduct this activity include a flashlight, cardboard, protractor and ruler. The resource includes background information, a pre-activity inquiry exploration for students, teaching tips and questions to guide student discussion. This is chapter 4 of Meteorology: An Educator's Resource for Inquiry-Based Learning for Grades 5-9. The guide includes a discussion of learning science, the use of inquiry in the classroom, instructions for making simple weather instruments, and more than 20 weather investigations ranging from teacher-centered to guided and open inquiry investigations.

Students will learn about the Transit of Venus through reading a NASA press release and viewing a NASA eClips video that describes several ways to observe transits. Then students will study angular measurement by learning about parallax and how astronomers use this geometric effect to determine the distance to Venus during a Transit of Venus. This activity is part of the Space Math multimedia modules that integrate NASA press releases, NASA archival video, and mathematics problems targeted at specific math standards commonly encountered in middle school textbooks. The modules cover specific math topics at multiple levels of difficulty with real-world data and use the 5E instructional sequence.

In this activity, students investigate how increasing the surface area of a chemical increases its reaction rate. Students will compare the reaction rates when a whole antacid tablet and a crushed tablet are added to separate beakers of water.

This webpage provides background information, multimedia resources, and articles related to the Apollo missions.

NASA presents this gallery of images from the Apollo 11 mission to the moon in 1969.

Students learn about the locations and geology of the six Apollo landing sites.

This video demonstrates how NASA is monitoring the salinity of the oceans and how salinity levels are related to ocean temperature and global climate.

Students will create a beautiful piece of art while learning to recognize the geology on planetary surfaces. In this project-based activity, students use the elements of art - shape, line, color, texture, value - to make sense of images of planets, asteroids, comets, and moons, honing observation skills and inspiring questions.

This site provides answers and photos for 200 common questions about astronomy and objects in space. Topics include planets, stars, the solar system, comets, asteroids, galaxies, and the night sky.

This site shows daily (back to June 16, 1995) a different image or photograph of the universe along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

NASA Astronomy Photo of the Day website hosted this photo of Earth at night in November 2000. The photo shows what Earth looks like at night with urban centers highlighted by concentrations of city lights. The image is a composite of hundreds of satellite photographs taken by orbiting Defense Meteorological Satellites Program satellites.

This online resource provides students background content that explores the relationship between atomic structure and light energy.

This is an activity about auroras and the scientific terminology used to describe them. Learners will read an article that provides an introduction to specific terms and concepts related to auroras and auroral substorms and examine photographs of a 2003 aurora and descriptions of an 1859 aurora to identify the various phases of auroral substorms. This is activity 11 from Exploring Magnetism: Magnetic Mysteries of the Aurora.

This is a lesson which gives students the opportunity to imagine they are scientists, provides them with a basic understanding of aurora and helps them to use creative methods in their observations. First, students will study the scientific aspect of the aurora. They will also look at images of the aurora (both pictures and illustrations) and describe what they think of when they see them. These descriptions can be stored in the student portfolios as they will be useful in future lessons. Includes teacher notes and instructions, student workshops and an online, animated story, and related teacher resources on aurora. This is lesson three of a collection of five activities that can be used individually or as a sequence; concludes with a KWL (Know/Want-to-know/Learned) assessment activity.