P A S S P O R T T O K N O W L E D G E
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N E W S L E T T E R # 6 O C T O B E R 3 0, 1 9 9 5
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Passport to Knowledge is a unique partnership between students, teachers, scientists, television producers, public and government agencies, cable companies, network operators, and community members of all ages and with diverse experiences. The goal is to blend the resources brought by:
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to create a field trip to the frontiers of science. We are in the final weeks of our Live from the Stratosphere Project.
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====>>> TOMORROW, before the witching hour, take a look out into the space that surrounds us and protects us. And join us in the excitement of finding new ways to go beyond what we can see and hear with our eyes.
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OCTOBER 31TH | | R E T U R N | |
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| |S T R A T O S P H E R E| |
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| \-----------------------/ | 14:00 - 15:00 EST
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Tomorrow at 14:00-15:00 Eastern time the last program of the "Live from the Stratosphere" Electronic Field: "RETURN TO THE STRATOPSHERE" will be broadcast on selected PBS stations across the country. NASA-TV will be carrying the broadcast (unless it is preempted by the Shuttle coverage).
Ku Band: Telestar 401, 97 degrees West Transponder 8 (PBS satellite feed) *remember to check with your own local PBS station for coverage!!!
C-Band: NASA-TV: Spacenet 2, 69 degrees West, Transponder 5
This broadcast will include the highlights of "Live From the Stratosphere". We hope all of you will be joining us and we are eager to hear your reactions, comments, etc. online.
VIDEOTAPES now available from NASA:
NASA CORE, Lorain County JVS
15181 Route 58 South, Oberlin, OH 44074
Phone: 216-774-1051, ext 293 or 294; Fax: 216-774-2144
Programs will be rebroadcast on NASA Television. We will post the schedule for rebroadcasts next week.
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__ ___|New in the biograhies section: |___ __
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\ :| |::| :| - more sound clips from participants| |::| | /
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Collaborative Projects |
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* * / Counting Stars, \
* * / \ How ya doin' ? /
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* * STAR CENSUS PROJECT
We are still looking for students to send us their Star Census Data reports. Look online for the progress in this collaborative activity.
''''''''''''''''''''''''''' ASKING SCIENCE QUESTIONS / ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Passport to Knowledge makes it possible for inquiring minds get the answers to the questions that they have. Here is one of the many questions that have been sent to "Live from the Stratosphere" and the response that was received.
*?* STUDENT QUESTIONS WILL CONTINUED TO BE ANSWERED UNTIL NOVEMBER 17TH *?*
QUESTION:
Why doesn't the KAO fly in the Mesosphere?
ANSWER from Kurt Richter on October 18,1995
Greetings from Alaska, Nick! Your question is a good one. First, I must
tell you that I was pretty lucky this summer. I have always wanted to work
with NASA and to work with scientists ever since I was 6 years old when the
first Sputnik was launched. Finally, this past summer, I was selected as
the FOSTER teacher from Alaska. FOSTER stands for Flight Opportunity for
Science Teacher EnRichment. So...I am a teacher/scientist/astronomer. The
teacher part of me works with fifth graders in Fairbanks, Alaska. The
astronomer/scientist part of me worked with NASA in San Francisco and
Hawaii aboard the KAO...the Kuiper Airborne Observatory. We observed NGC
1068...a star cluster containing a suspected black hole. We flew between
38,000 and 41,000 feet while making our observations.
It took us almost 5 hours to reach 41,000 feet. That is because our plane only has the kind of wing lift that a normal airplane would have. Since it is a large and heavy plane, it is configured so that it can take off and land on standard military runways. Perhaps if its wings were broader and the plane were lighter, it might have been able to go a bit higher...
The mesosphere is a layer of the atmosphere extending roughly from 50 km (30 miles) to 80 km (50 miles) above sea level. It lies between a lower region of the atmospere called the stratosphere and an upper region called the thermosphere.
A U-2 is capable of flying at roughly 65,000 ft...perhaps higher. This only puts it at about 12 miles...roughly 60% of the altitude it might need to reach the mesosphere.
The plane that I flew in...a C-141...can accomplish its goal at much lower altitudes. What is needed is not height...but lack of moisture. We achieve that at 41,000 feet quite nicely. It is what makes infrared spectroscopic analysis possible, because the infrared part of the spectrum is absorbed in the presence of water. As soon as we reach a height where there is a lack of moisture in the air so that we can perform our readings, we have accomplished the task of getting to where we can do our work without the expense of going higher.
Additionally...the atmosphere in the mesosphere is so thin that the cost of fuel as well as the design of the plane make it far too costly to go that high...when the job can be accomplished at the much lower altitude.
Thanks for the great question.
Sincerely,
Kurt
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- STUDENT WORK TO BE HIGHLIGHTED ONLINE:+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- |----------------------------------------------------------------| |------ STUDENT GALLERY OF WORK ON LFS ------| |------ Your student work could be posted on the Internet ------| |------ on our WEB SITE ------| |------ ------| |----------------------------------------------------------------| / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / ----------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | | | |
We hope the student gallery of learning will inspire your student to share what they have learned with others.
If you have materials that you would like to submit to the student gallery, please send them by email to
marc@quest.arc.nasa.gov
or place the information on disk and mail to:
Marc Siegel, NASA Ames Research Center Mailstop T-28H, Moffett Field, CA 94035 It would be best to send any written material on disk as opposed to on paper, if possible.
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| | For information on all online features, send Email | |
_-==-_ | | To: info-lfs@quest.arc.nasa.gov | |
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/| `--' |___) | Gopher Server quest.arc.nasa.gov | |
|| | | | Live From the Stratosphere Web site | |
(___\/___) |___|http://passporttoknowledge.com/lfs.html |___|
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PLEASE COPY THIS DISK SERVICE is a service to help those with minimal access to the Internet. Online materials are copied to disks that can be received through postal mail:
B & R Samizdat Express
P.O. Box 161
West Roxbury, MA 02132
http://www.tiac.net/users/samizdat
seltzer@samizdat.com
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NOW IS THE TIME TO HELP YOUR STUDENT REFLECT ON WHAT THEY HAVE LEARNED
Reflection followed by integration is a critical step in the learning process. When activities end without this valuable step, students often find it difficult to remember what they learned.
However, if you take the time to help students organize and file what they have learned, they will find that they have created many paths back through their memories. Seeing, hearing, thinking, talking and writing about their science adventure will help them create knowledge maps that will serve them well in new environments.
The Teacher's Guide has a number of suggestions and teachers discuss-lfs have been sharing many ideas for how to help students organize what they have learned. From research on past projects, the teachers that were most enthusiastic about student gains almost all involved their students in teaching others. In some cases, it was the parents, in other cases it was another grade of students who had not been a part of the adventure.
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& One of the best ways to learn something &
& is to agree to teach it someone else &
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the Information Infrastructure and Technology Applications program of NASA's Office of High Performance Computing and Communications, the NASA Astrophysics Division, NASA Ames Research Center, NASA Education, and PBS K-12 Learning Services. It is also supported, in part, by the National Science Foundation.
Live From the Stratosphere is a Passport to Knowledge project. The video programs are a co-production of GEOFF HAINES-STILES PRODUCTIONS and MARYLAND PUBLIC TELEVISION. "Night Flight to the Stars" is co-presented by WNET/New York.
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| Be on the lookout |
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| Live from the | Coming Soon to a Computer near you.....
| Stratosphere | *)////////////X=====================------
| EVALUATION |
| FORMS |
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Soon we will be asking you and your students to complete the evaluation forms for this project as well. We will need *everyone* to help with these. Even if you did not use the program with students, we want to know how you participated and your evalution of the resources.
COME FLY WITH US, COME FLY, COME FLY THE INFORMATION HIGHWAY, INTO THE STRATOSPHERE... INTO ORBIT, AND INTO THE FUTURE OF SCIENCE EDUCATION!
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. . . . . -=<((__*@*_ ______|== NEXT NEWSLETTER
. . +. + . \ \ | | November 6th
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LFS Newsletter Editor: Margaret Riel (mriel@weber.ucsd.edu)
