Learners investigate space travel. In this space travel lesson students examine space exploration history, engineers and scientists involved in space exploration, and Newton's third law of motion. Learners make rockets.

High schoolers discuss the benefits of the International Space Station. They evaluate the challenges the designers faced when trying to design the space station. Students discuss the use of scale models when designing large structures...

Students explore space. In this space lesson, students analyze the sky and what causes its changes. Students describe the moon patterns and use a model to show changes in its shape. Students also describe the first trip to the moon....

Space is about 60 miles from the surface of Earth. Pupils make calculations to model that distance by stacking coins the appropriate height using scale. They then explore the distance to objects in space such as satellites and the space...

How do you know there is air? Can you see it, smell it, feel it? To begin the investigation, learners watch a video and discuss what they know about air and the atmosphere. Then, they participate in five different hands-on, inquiry-based...

Students study the International Space Station and space exploration.  In this space travel lesson students describe the different types of engineers that contribute to space travel.

Students explore the different parts of the Cassini spacecraft. In this space science instructional activity, students create a model of the spacecraft using food products. They compare and contrast their model with the real one and...

Students discuss how better behavior can make their school a safer place. Using volunteers, they demonstrate being too close to someone when talking and invading their personal space. Using this example, they identify the three positive...

What do the Cold War and the Space Race have in common? Learners search for that answer and many more, helping them to build their knowledge of historical global politics and tensions between nations. Following the reading, they answer...

Reading, writing, and rings! A lesson from NASA combines space science with authentic reading and writing tasks. Included in this lesson are pre-reading activities, four mini informational booklets on Saturn, a structured...

Students explore space science by viewing a video in class. For this astronaut lesson, students identify the living habits of astronauts by researching the NASA website and observing a space science video in class. Students participate...

Students study the nomenclature, operation and purpose of America's Space Transportation system. They demonstrate how water can be broken down into its component gases of hydrogen and oxygen by electrolysis. They construct and use the...

Students view a video clip about the role of satellites in space. They examine the concept of center of mass. They participate in an experiment showing how altering the location of an object's center of mass can change its motion.

Third graders identify the different planets that make up the solar system. In this space science lesson plan, 3rd graders construct a scale model of the major planets. They explore their different unique features and dress up as planets.

Eighth graders study the objects in our solar system.  In this space lesson students identify and describe planets, then classify them as terrestrial or gaseous.

High schoolers interpret a message sent to space using a radio telescope and draw inferences from the interpreted message. Working with a partner, they interpret data that scientists believe is a message from aliens. They work on...

Learners investigate the challenges of space communication with a kinesthetic modeling activity. Group members In space must communicate one word to other members on Earth while overcoming barriers such as distance, gravity, and physical...

Traveling through space is an amazing experience, but it definitely takes a toll on the body. After reading an article and watching a brief video, learners perform an experiment that simulates the effects of zero gravity on the...

When astronauts get hungry in outer space, they can't just call and have a pizza delivered. In order to gain an appreciation for the challenges associated with space travel, young learners are given the task of selecting,...

Discover seven of the most historic aircraft and spacecraft in the collections of the National Air and Space Museum. By research into the major milestones of aviation history your students will recognize features that enable flight,...

Pre-schoolers gain a better understanding of personal space by playing this modified version of musical chairs. Played like musical chairs, students circle around a ring of hula hoops as music plays. When the music stops everyone needs...

Construct a maze in your classroom and have a blindfolded scientist act as a space rover, maneuvering unfamiliar terrain while another scientist plays commander. Classmates record the number of occurrences of the commander having to...

Students design an Aerogel model to capture clay particles. In this space science lesson, students discover what happens to comets as they hit a surface. They explain how the Aerogel technology would help scientists study comets better.

Young scientists gain a better understanding of space, the solar system and its vastness by creating a scale model. Students first need to calculate the distance between each of the nine planets according to the size of their scale. This...