Dancing Lights: Exploring the Aurora through Art and Writing is a science-in-literacy program about the aurora. Students in grades 3-5 write and illustrate their perceptions, ideas, and facts pertaining to auroral science. This short educator background primer was based upon interactions with teachers during Dancing Lights workshops and is meant as a quick guide to the science of the aurora.

This lesson plan focuses on the concepts of atomic number, mass number, isotope, and nuclear atom. A student quiz is included as an assessment instrument. This resource is from PUMAS - Practical Uses of Math and Science - a collection of brief examples created by scientists and engineers showing how math and science topics taught in K-12 classes have real world applications.

This article describes an approach designed to decrease math anxiety and teach students about the use of mathematical symbols simplifying radicals. A deck of cards is used in a demonstration, and a problem set using real life examples to master the use of radicals is included. This resource is from PUMAS - Practical Uses of Math and Science - a collection of brief examples created by scientists and engineers showing how math and science topics taught in K-12 classes have real world applications.

This article discusses the differences between ozone in the stratosphere and troposphere, and how NASA is measuring ozone using a spectrometer on-board the Aura satellite. The article includes an activity: building a spectroscope using a DVD cover and inexpensive materials.

This article discusses how the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) instrument found on the Terra satellite is used to understand how particles in the atmosphere interact with sunlight and how particle pollution affects Earth's climate. Directions for building a demonstration model of MISR out of cardboard tubes is included, along with short activities to show how it's multiple viewing angles allow MISR to differentiate the kinds of particles in the air because they scatter light differently, depending on their size, shape, and composition.

This is an article about detecting gravitational waves. Learners can read about how the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) is detecting gravitational waves. An activity is included about how to build a mini-LISA and use it to explore the technology behind the instrument.

This is a journal article and activity/demonstration about navigation in space. Learners will learn about gyroscopes by playing with a spinning bicycle wheel to demonstrate momentum, centripal force and angular momentum. First the spinning wheel is held perpendicular to the ground, then parallel to the ground, then it is hung from a string, and finally the wheel is held in the center by at its axle points while the person is on a swivel stool. The results are explained, specific vocabulary is introduced, and questions are presented. The article was originally published in The Technology Teacher, by the International Technology Education Association.

This is an article about the color of the sky. Learners will read about and discuss the colors of the day- and night-time skies. They may sing the Top-down Black and Blues, a song about the sky; or they may write a poem, essay, or song about the bluest sky or blackest night they have ever experienced.

This article describes an indoor, game-type demonstration, incorporating physics (EM wave modulation), math (binary codes), space technology, and music to show how spacecraft put information into the radio signals they send back to Earth. The article was originally written for and published by the International Technology Education Association in its journal, The Technology Teacher. It is now archived on The Space Place Web site.

This is an online set of information about astronomical alignments of ancient structures and buildings. Learners will read background information about the alignments to the Sun in such structures as the Great Pyramid, Chichen Itza, and others. Next, the site contains 10 short problem sets that involve a variety of math skills, including determining the scale of a photo, measuring and drawing angles, plotting data on a graph, and creating an equation to match a set of data. Each set of problems is contained on one page and all of the sets utilize real-world problems relating to astronomical alignments of ancient structures. Each problem set is flexible and can be used on its own, together with other sets, or together with related lessons and materials selected by the educator. This was originally included as a folder insert for the 2010 Sun-Earth Day.

This manual provides an overview of how telescopes have changed our understanding of the universe and contains simple demonstrations to use at star parties to get across basic ideas of optics. This manual will also help explain why the images that folks see at the eyepiece of a telescope at an outreach star party is so different from images published in magazines. The manual was produced to accompany an outreach toolkit developed for the NASA Night Sky Network. The toolkit is no longer being manufactured, but the activities are available through the manual, which can be freely downloaded.

In this problem-based learning activity, students are asked to research and make recommendations that balance the benefits of a healthy forest with the economic needs of the people who log it. Students use NIH Image software to analyze satellite imagery from Landsat. This activity is from Exploring the Environment.

In this activity, student teams design and conduct a scientific investigation in which they explore the conditions necessary for life. They conduct observations of environmental conditions both indoor and outdoor, and determine the range of variation they see. They compare these data with published temperature data for Earth, Mars, Pluto and Venus. The activity supports inquiry into the real world challenge of searching for life in extreme environments. The resource includes several student data sheets, data table and images, and a teacher's guide. Materials needed for this activity include weather instruments (e.g., thermometers, barometers, anemometers). This is Activity A of two activities in the first module, titled "Temperature variations and habitability," of the resource, "Earth Climate Course: What Determines a Planet's Climate?" The course aims to help students to develop an understanding of our environment as a system of human and natural processes that result in changes that occur over various space and time scales.

In this activity, student teams create a knowledge map of the essential characteristics or factors of a planet with a habitable climate, identifying range of inputs, outputs and variables of a planetary environmental system. Identified characteristics are compared to extreme environments on Earth, such as the Antarctic or the Sahara desert, and are used to consider the real life challenge of searching for life in extreme environments. The resource includes a student data sheet, questions, teacher's guide and scoring rubric. This is Activity B of two activities in the first module, titled "Temperature variations and habitability," of the resource, Earth Climate Course: What Determines a Planet's Climate? The course aims to help students to develop an understanding of our environment as a system of human and natural processes that result in changes that occur over various space and time scales.

Students examine graphical and tabular data to determine whether the evidence suggests that becomes COå_ concentrations and temperature rise can be linked causally. The resource provides graphs and tabular data for student investigation and a student worksheet. This is an activity from Space Update, a collection of resources and activities provided to teach about Earth and space. Summary background information, data and images supporting the activity are available on the Earth Update data site.

This activity is designed to help building student understanding of how scientific theories can change over time. Science theories change in the face of new evidence. However, when new explanatory frameworks, or theories, are proposed to explain scientific phenomena, there is often a lengthy period during which groups of scientists use different competing theories to explain the same phenomena. During the activity, students are introduced to the geocentric and heliocentric models, students compare the two models, and then observe the time it took to change the theory underpinning the heliocentric model. This activity is part of the "Swift: Eyes through Time" collection that is available on the Teacher's Domain website.

In this experiment, students create a "lava lamp" - a beaker on a hotplate, and investigate buoyancy, convection and other fluid and thermodynamic properties using ink, water, vegetable oil and Alka-Seltzer tablets. The activity is from PUMAS - Practical Uses of Math and Science - a collection of brief examples created by scientists and engineers showing how math and science topics taught in K-12 classes have real world applications.

Learners will read or listen to a story about two sisters, Marisol and Sofia, as they explore the Sun's role in the water cycle. Additionally, numerous extension resources are included in the accompanying educator guide, such as suggestions for no-cost language arts activities, links to further science activities, a book walk cue chart to guide classroom discussion before, during, and after the story, a graphic organizer, and alignments to the National Science Education Standards (NSES) and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS).

In this self-guided lesson, students read and learn about the history of Earth imaging and the Landsat satellite. They develop interpretation skills as they play a game that involves inferring the subjects of various Landsat images.

This is a lesson about Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Learners will examine and sort through images of Saturn's varied moons to see characteristics they share and those which set them apart. Students will write a paragraph about Saturn‰Ûªs moons and explain how they sorted them. This is lesson 8 of 10 in "Reading, Writing & Rings!" for grades 1-2.