Space Exploration- Mars & Rovers

For our space exploration themed week we talked all about Mars, focusing on the rovers NASA has sent there.  Class 1 was all about designing our rovers and getting them (safely) to Mars.  We discussed the essentials that they rovers would need for the tasks they'd be carrying out on the red planet and then did two drawings; one as a group (a circle drawing) collaborating like NASA engineers must do and one individually to let their creative juices flow.

 

We had real rover images and some fantasy robot books to inspire us.

We talked about the orbital patterns of Mars and Earth and the varying distances between the two planets.  The class did an activity to see  how hard it is to "land" on a particular spot that is rather far away.  They launched their marshmallow rovers to see if they could make it to Mars with a marshmallow shooter.

We talked about the amazing ways NASA has landed other rovers safely on the surface of Mars.

Then we tried our hand at simulating landing on Mars with our "rovers". 

First we simulated Mars surface with clay:

(Rover tracks)

(Gale Crater reproduction from a 3D printed model)

Then they built their own egg enclosures to keep their egg rovers safe as they plummeted to Mars.

  

 

Here are some great resources I used in both my lessons and in class:

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/participate/funzone/ Mars games from NASA

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/explore/curiosity/ Drive a rover around Mars- very nice!

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/interactives/edlcuriosity/index-2.html  

Video of curiosity landing

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/videos/index.cfm?v=32 Short video on how to get to Mars

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRCIzZHpFtY How Spirit/Opportunity landed

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/education/videos/playVideo.cfm?videoID=30   

Short video on how to land on Mars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4lewqblsx4 Nice composites of Mars photos

Rover we used: http://www.robotshop.com/productinfo.aspx?pc=RB-Owi-47&lang=en-US
Marshmallow shooter instructions/kits: http://www.instructables.com/id/Marshmallow-gun/