AERONAUTICS

A Guide for Teachers with Science, Math, and Technology Activities

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Educational Product for Teachers, Grades 2-4

EG-2002-06-105-HQ

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This guide, called Aeronautics—An Educator's Guide with Activities in Science, Mathematics, and Technology Education, can be found online through NASA Spacelink. Spacelink is one of NASA's tools made just for teachers and students.

You can find this guide and other NASA learning materials at:
http://spacelink.nasa.gov/products

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Aeronautics

A Guide for Teachers with Activities in Science, Math, and Technology

What pilot, astronaut, or airplane engineer didn't start out with a toy glider?

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

This guide was made by the government, so anyone can copy and use it for free. You don't need permission.

EG-2002-06-105-HQ

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ................................................................. 1

Preface / How to Use This Guide ......................................... 2

Charts (Matrices)

• Science Standards ............................................................. 3
• Math Standards .................................................................. 4
• Science Skills .................................................................... 5

NASA's Aerospace Technology Team ..................................... 6
Aeronautics Facts for Teachers ............................................ 7

Activities

Air

• Air Engines ......................................................................... 12
• Dunked Napkin ................................................................... 17
• Paper Bag Mask .................................................................. 23
• Wind in Your Socks ............................................................. 29
• Air: More Activities for Different Subjects .......................... 36

Flight

• Bag Balloons ....................................................................... 40
• Sled Kite .............................................................................. 44
• Right Flight .......................................................................... 52
• Delta Wing Glider ................................................................ 60
• Rotor Motor .......................................................................... 69
• Flight: More Activities for Different Subjects ........................ 76

We Can Fly, You and I

• Making Time Fly .................................................................. 80
• Where is North? The Compass Can Tell Us ......................... 87
• Let's Build a Table Top Airport ............................................ 91
• Plan to Fly There .................................................................. 97
• We Can Fly, You and I: More Activities for Different Subjects .. 107

Appendix

• The Parts of an Airplane ................................................... 110
• Aeronautics Word List ....................................................... 111
• Suggested Reading .......................................................... 115
• NASA Resources for Teachers .......................................... 118
• Evaluation Reply Card .............................................. Back Cover

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Photo Credits

Photos on the cover and inside pages came from NACA files, NASA files, and photographers Nick Galante, Mike Smith, Jim Ross, Ted Huetter, and Carla Thomas.

Special thanks to:
Michelle Davis, Lee Duke, Jim Fitzgerald, Deborah Gallaway, Jane George, Doris Grigsby, Yvonne Kellogg, Marianne McCarthy, Joan Sanders, Greg Vogt, Deborah Dyer Wahlstrom, and Ralph Winrich. The airplane drawings were made by Dennis Calaba and Marco Corona.

This guide was created at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, with help from NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

Editors: Pat Biggs, Ted Huetter

Writers: Charles Anderson, Pat Biggs, Deborah Brown, Steve Culivan, Sue Ellis, James Gerard, Ellen Hardwick, Norm Poff, Carla Rosenberg, Deborah Shearer, Octavia Tripp, Ron Ernst

Art Direction and Layout: Ted Huetter

Illustrations: Rod Waid

Photo: The NACA X-1 Research Aircraft, 1946

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How to Use This Guide

This guide starts with charts showing which education standards and skills each activity teaches. It also includes a look at NASA's aeronautics mission and a short history of flight. The activities are grouped into three chapters:

• Air
• Flight
• We Can Fly, You and I

The activities are written to help teachers lead their class. Each activity starts with three things: (1) the goals of the activity, (2) the education standards and skills it covers, and (3) background information about the topic. Then come step-by-step directions, with pictures, to help you guide your students through the activity.

Each activity also includes "student pages." You can spot these pages by a special icon. Student pages might be a simple picture of the activity, or they might be a worksheet. They are meant to go along with your teaching, remind students what to do, and help spark their own ideas. For activities where students build something step by step, the student pages show the project in a way that even students who can't read yet can follow.

Each chapter ends with a list of extra activities that connect to other school subjects.

This guide belongs to everyone. You do not need permission to copy it.

Preface

Welcome to the exciting world of aeronautics! This word comes from France, and it was built from two Greek words meaning "air" and "to sail." Aeronautics is the study of flight and how aircraft work. This guide explains basic ideas about flight, teaches you about the history of flying, and connects these ideas to the world around flight — like the air itself, airports, and how pilots find their way.

The activities in this guide are meant to be simple and fun. They were created by specialists from NASA's Aerospace Education Services Program. These experts have used the activities successfully in workshops and school programs all across the United States. The activities help students explore how flight works, while also using real math, science, and technology skills.

Flight is a topic that has always had a special power to make learning exciting.

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Activity Charts

The next few pages show charts, called matrices. These charts list all thirteen activities in the guide — like Air Engines, Dunked Napkin, Sled Kite, and Plan to Fly There. Next to each activity, the charts mark which science standards, math standards, and science skills the activity teaches. This helps teachers quickly see what each activity covers.

Science Standards covered include: Science as Inquiry; Position and Motion of Objects; Properties of Objects and Materials; Evidence, Models, and Explanation; Science and Technology; Science in Social and Personal Perspectives; and the History and Nature of Science.

Math Standards covered include: Problem Solving; Communication; Reasoning; Connections; Measurement; Checking and Understanding Results; Estimation; Prediction; and Graphs.

Science Skills covered include: Observing; Communicating; Measuring; Collecting Information; Predicting; Making Charts and Graphs; Investigating; Understanding Data; Making Inferences (smart guesses based on clues); Controlling Variables (the things that can change in an experiment); and Making Models.

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NASA's Aerospace Technology Team

NASA's Aerospace Technology Team has an important job: to create new technology that solves problems in air and space travel. Their work helps keep the United States a leader in aerospace technology, keeps our country safe, and shares the benefits of new inventions with everyone.

To keep up with fast-changing communication and computer technology, we also need better ways to travel. To explore space further — for both science and business — we need space travel that costs less and is safer and more dependable.

Our economy and our daily lives depend on air travel that is safe and good for the environment. People need to be able to move quickly, safely, and affordably from place to place.

By working with partners in businesses, the government, and universities, NASA created four big goals to keep the United States a leader in air and space travel in the future:

• Revolutionize (completely改变 and improve) aviation
• Advance space travel
• Create new, groundbreaking technology
• Turn new technology into products people can use

Revolutionize Aviation

NASA's goal to revolutionize aviation means making air travel safer and better for the environment as it grows. This includes:

• Increase safety — Make flying even safer by cutting the number of aircraft accidents to one-fifth of what it is now within 10 years, and to one-tenth within 25 years.
• Reduce emissions — Emissions are the gases that come out of airplane engines. Cutting them helps protect the air we breathe and our planet's climate. NASA wants to cut one harmful gas, called NOx, by 70 percent within 10 years and by 80 percent within 25 years.