From: Mail Delivery Subsystem <MAILER-DAEMON@nick.arc.nasa.gov> (by way of Geoffrey Haines-Stiles <ghaines@mail.arc.nasa.gov>)
Subject: "PASSPORT TO KNOWLEDGE" BROADCAST PLANS FOR 1997-1998
Date: Fri, 19 Sep 1997 16:05:15 -0400
<I also plan to get the discuss-lfm address right in future: promise!> *** Dear Discuss-lfm'ers and PTK Advocates (yes, if you see this message twice, junk one!) Many of you have inquired about dates for next spring, and flyers to distribute at conferences: the latter are in process to support Advocates who are active in outreach (and you know who you are... ) but we wanted to give all of you some thoughts for the Spring. As you can see, we've kept to our intention of offering LIVE FROM THE RAINFOREST, but NSF's plan to make "POLAR CONNECTIONS" the theme of its 1998 National Science and Technology Week was just too attractive (given our affection for Antarctica) for us not to modify plans to offer a truly special LIVE FROM THE POLES on April 28th. You'll see brief descriptions of all the programs below. This year we're also working even more closely with PBS: you'll see their logo joining NASA's and NSF's. This should make your local PBS station even more willing to carry the programs, either live or at least on tape delay. PBS has already sent out announcements to education and outreach directors at ALL PBS stations and many state and local educational TV networks. But, as you know, "check local listings" remains essential advice. And if you find your local station questions the educational or other value of PTK/LIVE FROM programs please direct him or her to us, or vice versa: we're continuing to accumulate solid evaluation data indicating that the 3 "T" 's (Television, Tele-computing, and -- most importantly -- a dedicated Teacher) can and do make a difference in sharing current content, nurturing positive attitudes towards science and high technology and helping students practise the research and communications skills they'll need in the world of work. More on evaluation on this list later, after these hectic first few weeks of school. So here are the dates and plans. Feel free to go public with these in any media until we get the revised flyers out (and we plan this year to have them also in PDF format on the Web to make them even easier to access and distribute), and please get involved with WEATHER WORLDS, this Fall's online collaborative activity. On behalf of the entire PASSPORT TO KNOWLEDGE team, Onwards and Upwards, to Mars and beyond... Geoff Haines-Stiles *** PASSPORT TO KNOWLEDGE presents... LIVE FROM MARS Subject/Focus: Science (with interdisciplinary extensions to math, language arts, social studies, computers, etc.) Grades: middle school and upper elementary (& also high school) Price: Teacher's Guide pack (includes Guide, copy masters of student worksheets, poster, and NASA Fact Sheets): $20.00 Multimedia Kit (boxed, including Guide pack, resource video, slide set, "Explorer's Guide to Mars" poster/map, "Mars Navigator" CD-ROM, and more): $99.00 Videotapes: call for availability and pricing of the 2 one hour programs aired during the 1996-97 school year, and the 2 two hour specials broadcast during Pathfinder's first week on Mars! LIVE FROM MARS continues to track NASA's two current missions to Mars, allowing students--for the first time ever--to follow planetary spacecraft from pre-launch through landing! LIVE FROM MARS includes two broadcasts: "Destination Mars" Tuesday, October 30, 1997 13:00 Eastern This program reprises highlights of the programs presented during the 1996-97 school year and provides an update on the highly successful July 4, 1997, landing of Mars "Pathfinder" on the Red Planet, and the first months spent on Mars by the micro-rover, "Sojourner," (named by a high-school student for 19th Century abolitionist Sojourner Truth.) For new teachers and students "Destination Mars" provides a comprehensive introduction to Mars and why we study it, the character and purposes of NASA's two missions, and behind-the-scenes vignettes of the men and women who fly the missions. NASA's second Mars spacecraft, "Global Surveyor," an orbiter rather than a lander, arrived succecssfully at the Red Planet on September 11, 1997, and the program will showcase some of the earliest images and data returned. "Today on Mars" Tuesday, November 13, 1997 13:00 Eastern With the very latest images and the first analyses of scientific data from Mars "Global Surveyor," and more "ground truth" from the "Pathfinder" lander, this program provides a kind of weathercast from the alien planet that in many ways is most like Earth. The daily cycle of ice, frosts, clouds, and dust storms will be followed through computer-enhanced images from the lander, and compared and contrasted to Earth. The program will also feature results from the WEATHER WORLDS online collaborative activity in which students will gather local weather data and report it online, to compare and contrast their findings with NASA's results from Mars! Also featured will be hands-on activities which simulate the work of instruments on NASA's spacecraft, and interaction between students and the researchers who operate the actual "tools". Through "Sojourner" 's robot eyes we'll see virtual reality sequences which track the first-ever rover on Mars as it travels around the planet. Real time interactions allow students to question NASA's scientists about the latest findings and to hear about the future of interplanetary exploration. Passport to Knowledge is supported, in part, by the National Science Foundation and NASA. Live From Mars is a Special Project undertaken by Passport to Knowledge and the American Museum of Natural History, in collaboration with NASA's Office of Space Science and NASA JPL's Mars Exploration Directorate, and Mississippi State University. *** LIVE FROM THE RAINFOREST (ed. note: we'll almost certainly use rainforest as ONE WORD, though abbreviating the project to LFRF) Science and Social Studies, with interdisciplinary extensions to math, language arts, computers, etc. Grades: (as above for LFM) Price: Teacher's Guide pack (including Guide, poster, student worksheets, and more) $20.00 Multimedia Kit (including Guide pack, teacher resource video with rainforest background and classroom demonstrations, sample online materials, and more) $125.00 Call for pricing on the 3 one hour videos. Three one-hour programs take students via live TV and the Internet around the world to visit rainforests on four continents. Then students will look back home to connect the science and social studies they've experienced to North America's own diverse environments, exploring issues of biodiversity by comparing El Yunque in Puerto Rico and the temperate rain forest of the Pacific NorthWest, as well as urban backlots, with the amazing and instructive international sites they've seen. "Mission to Planet Earth" Tuesday, April 7, 1998 13:00 Eastern This program will show the diversity of rain forests around our planet, and their connection to how we live, no matter where we live. State-of-the-art visualizations show how ground truth and remote sensing combine to give the most current picture of a dynamic and living ecosystem. "Worlds Beneath the Canopy" Tuesday, April 14, 1998 13:00 Eastern Real time interaction between students in North America, and researchers on camera in Brazil focuses on the many animal species to be found in the varied ecological niches provided by rain forests. Students will also see how sustainable development can assist the human inhabitants of the rain forest, while preserving viable environments of animals, plants and living organisms which are a library of genetic diversity created by nature over the eons. NASA images demonstrate how satellite technology can assist nations in long-term monitoring and management of their resources. "Connect Globally, Act Locally" Tuesday, April 21, 1998 13:00 Eastern >From the Brazilian and North American rainforests and urban backlots, where lessons of biodiversity are literally brought home, the third and final program will show how the Internet and educational telecommunications can create new, ongoing collaborations between world-class researchers and secondary school students. PTK is supported, in part, by the National Science Foundation and NASA. *** LIVE FROM THE POLES a PASSPORT TO KNOWLEDGE/NATIONAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY WEEK special Tuesday, April 28, 1998 13:00 Eastern Science and social studies, with interdisciplinary connections to math, language arts, computers, etc. Grades (as above) Materials: a Guide with Activities will be available from NSF: free. PTK will NOT be publishing its own Guide or Multimedia Kit, but will be offering an original video compilation from our archive of over 100 hours of original Antarctic footage, and will be readying an "Encyclopedia Antarctica" CD-ROM. The LIVE FROM ANTARCTICA and LFA 2 Guides and/or Kit remain available and are valuable companions to NSF materials. In honor of NSF's National Science and Technology Week, whose theme for 1998 is "Polar Connections: Exploring the World's Natural Laboratories," PTK presents a live, one hour special linking students across North America with researchers literally "up North" and way "down South", via interactive videoconferencing. Students will see the great differences between the Arctic and Antarctic, and find out--for example--why and how humans have long inhabited the northern polar regions, but never traveled south except as seasonal and temporary explorers. Why are there polar bears up north, but no penguins, and vice versa at the other end of the globe? Just as in PTK's previous two LIVE FROM ANTARCTICA Modules, cutting-edge telecommunications will bring home science relevant to the core curriculum, but give it a very human face, as we see amazing scenes of the lives and careers of the men and women who brave hardships and go to extremes to understand Earth's last frontiers. *** Questions, comments, suggestions, as usual, are welcome! GHS Geoff Haines-Stiles Project Director, PASSPORT TO KNOWLEDGE & the LIVE FROM... specials "electronic field trips to scientific frontiers" Real Science, Real Scientists, Real Locations, Real Time vox: 973.656.9403 * fax: 973.656.9813 * mobile: 908.305.7061 alt. e-mail: ptkghs@aol.com http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/interactive Antarctica... Stratosphere... Hubble... Mars... and more