Lunar Exploration
For Educators Grades K-8
August 2-6, 2010
Utilize the excitement of NASA's return to the moon mission to excite and educate students. This course will focus address the formation of the moon and solar system, various aspects of lunar exploration, including the Apollo and Constellation Program, challenges in getting to the moon and the technologies needed for a moon base. Comparisons between earth based energy production and possible moon based energy production will be discussed. K-6 student activities will compliment each daily theme, integrating content with practical classroom activities.
Teachers will be provided opportunities throughout the following school year to meet regularly via web based technology, discussing implementation successes, struggles and solutions.
National Science Education Standards
• Physical Science K-4: Position and motion of objects
• Physical Science 5-8: Motions and forces
• Earth and Space Science K-4: Objects in the sky
• Earth and Space Science 5-8: Earth’s history
• Earth and Space Science 5-8: Earth in the solar system
Pennsylvania Academic Standards for Science and Technology with Assessment Anchors
• Physical Science, Chemistry, Physics K-4: Different types of force and motion
• Physical Science, Chemistry, Physics K-4: Composition of the universe and the earth’s place
in it, recognize earth’s place, describe solar system motions, major lunar phases and eclipses
• Physical Science, Chemistry, Physics 5-8: Principles of force and motion
• Physical Science, Chemistry, Physics 5-8: Essential ideas of the universe and the earth’s
place in it.
The workshops are an outreach program of NASA's Pennsylvania Space Grant Consortium, the Eberly College of Science, the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, the Penn State Astrobiology Research Center, NASA Astrobiology Institute, the NSF-funded Penn State Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).