| Ask
yourself...
What do you already know about the planet Mars?
Make... A list of things you know
about the planet.
Over the course of the next
four assignments, you will learn about the history
of Mars exploration and why Mars is one of the
new frontiers in interplanetary space travel.
Some questions we will answer
in this section include:
- What is Mars like?
- How is it similar to and how is it different
from Earth?
- How is it similar to or different from the
other planets in our solar system?
- Do you think Mars would be an interesting
place to explore?
- Do you think humans will live there someday?
In
this lesson, you will look at Mars in the night
sky, as people have done for thousands of years
with the naked eye, and see images of it from
the small telescopes. You will see what astronomers
saw using the first large telescopes located in
observatories. Then, you will learn about its
size and composition, and about its atmosphere
and weather. Then you will learn about the geology
of the planet, its volcanoes, craters, canyons,
and ice caps. You will consider the evidence for
water on Mars by looking at images of possible
flood plains, river channels, and shorelines.
Finally, you will explore the possibility of whether
life could have existed on Mars in the past, or
may continue to exist today. After learning about
the characteristics of the red planet, you can
then begin to explore the kinds of robotic and
human missions that could be sent to Mars.
You
will use a variety of 3-D and virtual models,
interactive games and tutorials, videos, audios,
and images to explore the red planet Mars. For
your assignment, you will answer three questions
about the planet Mars, investigate three research
questions of your own, and complete the Mars math
problems.
In
the Liftoff
section, there are many images, links, videos
and interactive models and games to link to on
the internet. The Mission
section is the activity that you need to turn
in via the Comm
Link. Don't forget to do the Quick
Quiz after you have done the reading.
The Extended
Mission is a collection of links on the topic
that you can use for further information, it is
divided up into Activities and Research.
When deciding on a final project the extensions
are a good way to begin.
Chapters
in this lesson include:
NOTE: Some of the links
in these lessons require these:
Click on any of the links to
get these plug-ins for your browser installed
for free if you do not already have them. If you
are using America Online (AOL), you may experience
some problems with this course.
Please use only Internet
Explorer for this course. The pages
will not display properly in Netscape and we do
not recommend using AOL.
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