Star Ship Adventure

Is There Life Up There?

Introduction: On the field trip we took last week to the Chicago Botanical Gardens, we looked at different plants and trees.  We also saw some deer, rabbits, raccoons and other animals in the park nearby. We talked about the kinds of things these plants and animals need in order to live on Earth.  

    Now the President of NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) has learned that a meteor will crash to Earth next year. This meteor will wipe out the whole world.

NASA only has enough money to spend on one test flight to one planet.  You must decide if we should spend that money on going to Neptune, Venus, or Mars. In other words, upon which planet could our human race most successfully live?

The Task: You will need to help in finding us a new home, a new planet to live upon.  NASA wants to fly us to outer space to live on one of these planets.  The three questions they are asking YOU are:  (1) Could  there be water on these planets?  (2) Could these planet support life -- could people live on them?  (3) What types of things might we need to adapt to life on these planets? (HINT: Think about some of the same conditions we discussed that life needs in order to thrive when we visited the Botanical Gardens.)

Your teacher will put you into one of three groups. Group 1 will be Astronauts; Group 2 will be Geologists; Group 3 will be President of NASA.

Appoint one person in your group to take notes.  You will use our computers in class plus books and videos.

     Your teacher will ask two Astronauts, two Geologists, and two Presidents from each group to participate in a news conference skit. During this skit, the teacher will ask these six people the three questions above.  So be sure you and your group have read the information on the Internet sites below, listed under Resources.

The people from each group who are not one of the six answering the teacher's questions will still have a chance to participate in the skit.  They will be news reporters attending our news conference skit.  They will ask questions to the six people in the news conference, after the six have answered the teacher's three questions. 

Resources:

Click on this picture of the astronaut if you're an Astronaut.

Click on this picture of Earth if you're a Geologist..

Click on this famous lady from NASA picture if you're a President of NASA..    

Click HERE FOR OTHER RESOURCES:

The Process

1.  Your teacher will assign you to be either in one of the Astronaut,        Geologist or President of  NASA groups.

2.  You will be at the computer with two of your classmates.   One of you will take notes from what you read on the monitor and in the books (OTHER RESOURCES).  Another student will read from the monitor, and the third student will operate the mouse.  Your teacher will tell you the Internet address for the Star Ship Adventure - Is There Life Up There? page.

3.  Click HERE to go to a table with questions to get you going..

4.  Use the questions in the table to help your group think, discuss, write and organize your group's ideas.

5.  Remember your main goal is to COMPARE each planet's potential to become a new home for people.  Which planet would be the best choice to spend our government's space travel money to visit?  What are the reasons for YOUR choice?

EVALUATION:

Your teacher will give each of you a grade based upon the Collaboration Rubric Sheet we've talked about in class before.  Click HERE to see a copy of that sheet.

32 - 36 points = A

27 - 31 points = B

21 - 26 points = C

16 - 20 points = D

15 and below = F

Conclusion:

The purpose of this Space Ship Adventure is to start you wondering, when you look up into a starry sky in the night, "Could there be life up there?" What do YOU think? It might be FUN to compare the type of creatures you might imagine on another planet to characters from fairy tales.  Click HERE if you'd like to take a fairy tale journey, AFTER you finish this assignment!

Last Update February 2005 by Trisha Armstrong