1:00pm - 2:00pm
Our professional development after lunch was on a topic called Mission Geography. We received a disk full of activities for all grades about how to use NASA (such as space imaging) to teach geography.
I was very thankful for this resource because geography is definitely not one of my strong points. I thought the activities were very interesting as well!
Activity: Pocket Solar System
This activity allows students to learn about the size of the solar system and the length between the planets. To make this project, you only need a sheet of receipt paper and a writing utensil. It involves folding and labeling, and really shows you how close together the first few planets are and how far away Pluto is.
Activity: Night Space Imaging Puzzle
For our first activity, we had to cut out pieces of a picture of the United Sates from space at night to make a puzzle. The picture was only black and white, so we had to piece together the puzzle based on areas of high light (big cities), areas of jagged, large dark areas (oceans) and shapes of the states.
It involved a lot of higher-order thinking and taught us about geography and population.
Activity: Mars and Earth Process Match
Our second activity involved using our knowledge gained on Tuesday about land processes (impacts, mountains, etc) and we had to compare the processes between Earth and Mars.
This activity taught us about what processes are similar on the different planets and therefore how they both form.
Activity: ISS EarthKAM Bingo
For ISS EarthKam Bingo, each group received a bingo board which had pictures of Earth from a space craft, aircraft, or the ground. The students must match the process and where the camera is to be able to cover that square. For example, if the caller calls out 'Stadium, air' the students must find the picture of a stadium taken from an airplane. This activity involves critical thinking to determine what each picture is of and where the picture is taken from. This bingo builds spatial relationships and vocabulary.
FYI: NASA has two programs, the EarthKAM and the MoonKAM which you can use to view pictures of the Earth from the ISS and view pictures of the Moon, respectively. This is a great way to view anywhere on Earth from space, and will be great for students who have lived in or have been to other places and would like to compare. Students and teachers can also request specific pictures to be taken from space here. (Ps. KAM stands for Knowledge Aquired Middle School)
Some final topics we discussed during this presentation were:
- What is a planet? Based on the controversy between the reclassification of Pluto, NASA has gone to greater lengths to educate on what a planet actually is. See that video here.
- Dark Sky Network - Visit http://nightsky.jpl.nasa.gov/ to see the Night Sky website. This site is highly recommended. It has all the information you need to know about astronomy, all in one place. This includes clubs that have events near your school (there is an 'International Observe the Moon Night' coming up near me in September), as well as lesson plans, activities, and representatives that will visit your school.
- View the ISS from Earth - this was not discussed during this development, but one of our coordinators did mention it yesterday and I just remembered to add this in. You can actually see the ISS (International Space Station) from Earth at night, a few times a month! You can go online to this site to find out the exact date and time the ISS is available from your city, as well as for how long. I was excited to find that the ISS will be visible for 3 minutes tonight from Johnson Space Center at 9:18pm! (By the way... I never thought I would be at the point in my life that I would be excited about something like this).
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