HR: 1330h
AN: ED22A-1230    [PDF]
TI: NASA's Astro-Venture Engages Exceptional Students in Earth System Science Using Inquiry
AU: * OGuinn, C
EM: christina.m.oguinn@nasa.gov
AF: Christina OGuinn, NASA Ames Research Center, MS 226-4, Moffett Field, CA 94035 United States
AB: Astro-Venture is an educational, interactive, multimedia Web environment highlighting NASA careers and astrobiology research in the areas of Astronomy, Geology, Biology and Atmospheric Sciences. Students in grades 5-8 role-play NASA careers, as they search for and design a planet with the necessary characteristics for human habitation. Astro-Venture uses online multimedia activities and off-line inquiry explorations to engage students in guided inquiry aligned with the 5 E inquiry model. This model has proven to be effective with exceptional students. Students are presented with the intellectual confrontation of how to design a planet and star system that would be able to meet their biological survival needs. This provides a purpose for the online and off-line explorations used throughout the site. Students first explore "what" conditions are necessary to support human habitability by engaging in multimedia training modules, which allow them to change astronomical, atmospheric, geological and biological aspects of the Earth and our star system and to view the effects of these changes on Earth. By focusing on Earth, students draw on their prior knowledge, which helps them to connect their new knowledge to their existing schema. Cause and effect relationships of Earth provide a concrete model from which students can observe patterns and generalize abstract results to an imagined planet. From these observations, students draw conclusions about what aspects allowed Earth to remain habitable. Once students have generalized needed conditions of "what" we need for a habitable planet, they conduct further research in off-line, standards-based classroom activities that also follow the inquiry model and help students to understand "why" we need these conditions. These lessons focus on standards-based concepts such as states of matter and the structure and movement of the Earth's interior. These lessons follow the inquiry structure commonly referred to as the five E's as follows: Engage: Draws on students' prior knowledge, builds on previous lesson concepts, introduces the purpose of the lesson and the scientific question which is the problem or intellectual confrontation they will explore. Explore: Students form hypotheses and conduct an exploration that will help them to collect data and evidence to answer the scientific question. Explain: Students reflect on the explore activity by recording their results and conclusions. They participate in guided discussions or activities that help to guide their understanding of the concepts. Extend/Apply: Students demonstrate their understanding of the concept and/or apply it to another situation. Evaluate: Students are evaluated on their understanding of the concept often using rubrics. After students have mastered the "whats" and "whys," they engage in multimedia mission modules that simulate "how" scientists might search for a planet and star system that meets these requirements using the inquiry process. Students are first asked to hypothesize the likelihood of finding a star system that meets these requirements. They then simulate the methods scientists might use to collect data on various stars and planets to deduce whether the star system meets the requirements for habitability or not. After collecting and analyzing this data, students are asked to draw conclusions in comparing their results to their initial hypothesis. Students apply all that they've learned to design a planet that meets the requirements for human habitability in all areas. Through this process, they learn that Earth works as a system in meeting our needs.
UR: http://astroventure.arc.nasa.gov
DE: 0399 General or miscellaneous
DE: 6605 Education
DE: 6630 Workforce
DE: 7299 General or miscellaneous
DE: 7599 General or miscellaneous
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting