Online Learning Activities
NASA: Challenging the Space Frontier
Once students accept their mission, they can blast off through time to study famous astronauts, the history of space exploration, and more through fun interactive learning games.
- Grades: 1–2, 3–5, 6–8, 9–12
“Challenging the Space Frontier” offers students the chance to learn the historical impact of space exploration through a time line, quizzes, and various reading and writing activities.
- Starting with a time line, students first learn the history of space travel, including 25 space firsts and three pivotal space missions — Friendship 7, Apollo 11, and STS-7.
- Students will also get to meet several heroes of space travel while browsing the time line: astronauts Buzz Aldrin on Apollo 11, Sally Ride (the first American woman in space) on STS-7, and Mae Jemison (the first black female astronaut).
- Then, using the Tom Snyder ® Productions' Timeliner, students can Make Your Own Timeline of important dates and photos of space exploration, building on what they’ve just learned.
Plus, students can:
- Browse compelling Photos of NASA Tools & Toys and fun Photos of Animals in Space
- Go on a NASA Web Hunt, which gets students sharpening their Internet skills by exploring NASA’s Website
- Read The Moon and the Sun Research Starter, which offers recommended resources to further study space travel
- Watch the Apollo 11 Mission Real Time Recreation, a unique online application that brings the Apollo 11 mission to life in “real time”
- Journey Into Space With the American Museum of Natural History offers another great opportunity to conduct online research on the subject of space
Learning Objectives
While participating in "Challenging the Space Frontier," students will:
- Learn about the history of space exploration in the context of the "space race" during the Cold War
- Improve content-area reading skills, including comprehension and vocabulary
- Reflect on what has been learned after reading by formulating ideas, opinions, and personal responses
- Use discussion with peers as a way of understanding information
- Learn to do online research
- Develop thoughtful, focused questions about their reading
- Create a timeline using information and media from their own research
- Subjects:Language Arts, American History, Reading Comprehension, Space Travel, Real-World Science, Scientists and Human Endeavor, Jobs, Careers, Work, Historic Figures, Inventors and Inventions
- Skills:Reading Comprehension, Science, Social Studies
