Sunday, July 19, 2009

Apollo Moon Mission


TeachersFirst Update - July 20 & 27, 2009

To The Moon!
If you are teaching this week --or even if you are not -- do not miss the first featured site this week, the John F. Kennedy Library's online re-enactment of the Apollo 11 moon mission, in "real time" but 40 years later. If you cannot use this site with students this week, fear not. It will remain online for your use indefinitely, allowing you to "experience" the events all over again, complete with all the NASA transmissions. No longer is the moon landing a "once in a lifetime," but it still feels like one. Read more about it.

We Choose the Moon - John F. Kennedy Library Grades 0 to 12

Relive the Apollo 11 moon mission in rich multimedia format. Follow the mission in "real time" exactly 40 years later, including all transmissions. For those who are not old enough to remember the 1969 mission, the real experience is powerful. For those who do remember, this site can spark personal commentary and oral history of the historic days during the summer of 1969. Offered by the John F. Kennedy library, this re-enactment started in 40-year-old "real time in July, 2009, but can be accessed and experienced in all or in part at any time after its "conclusion" on July 20, 2009. This is the ultimate "primary source"!

In the Classroom:
Bring your class into the space exploration era on a projector or interactive whiteboard (be sure to turn on speakers!). Include this experience as part of a unit on the 1960s, a science study and comparison of technologies since the 1960s, or as part of a unit about the moon. Allow students to explore and navigate the site on their own, then write a "blog post" as an astronaut or a NASA worker in 1969. "Follow" the mission in real time over a period of several days, letting it run on your classroom computer, and assigning different students to report on the day's events. Explore some of the actual flight data in physics class as a practical application of some of Newton's laws. Use this site as a spark for students to collect oral histories on this and other events of the 1960s, using media resources as prompts to talk with family and friends about their recollections.
Source: http://www.teachersfirst.com/single.cfm?id=10146

Resources: http://geocities.com/mrsjacksonsclass/spaceshuttles.htm

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