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"Exploring the Universe: Orbiting Objects" is a hands-on activity that invites visitors to experiment with different sized and weighted balls on a stretchy fabric gravity well. The activity models gravitational attraction in space. Participants investigate how changing conditions can cause...

"Exploring the Solar System: Solar Eclipse" is a hands-on activity demonstrating how the particular alignment of the Sun, Earth, and Moon can cause an eclipse. Visitors investigate the positions of these objects to create shadows and learn about solar eclipses....

This is a simple reference sheet, offering basic tips for leading the hands-on activities in your toolkit. It includes suggestions for engaging and encouraging visitors, as well as for handling difficult concepts and misconceptions. PDF and DOC formats included.

"Exploring the Solar System: Craters" is an active, hands-on activity that demonstrates how craters form, and what they can teach us about the history and composition of planets and moons. By dropping objects of various sizes and shapes into a...

"Exploring Earth: Bear’s Shadow" is a hands-on activity designed primarily for young visitors and their families. Participants move a flashlight around an object to make and experiment with shadows. The activity can be connected to a storybook about a little...

In "Exploring the Universe: Exoplanet Transits," participants simulate one of the methods scientists use to discover planets orbiting distant stars. Even when a planet is too far away to observe directly, scientists can infer its presence by watching for slight,...

"Exploring the Universe: Imagining Life" is a hands-on activity in which visitors imagine and draw an extreme environment beyond Earth, then invent a living thing that could thrive in it. They learn that NASA scientists study extremophiles on Earth to...

This Explore Science: Earth & Space events video highlights just a few of our NISE Net partnering institutions and their incredible work hosting events in 2017 in their communities between March and August of 2017. There are two version of...

This slideshow presentation (with accompanying notes) acts as a quick overview of your Explore Science: Earth & Space toolkit and the individual activities contained within.

"Exploring Earth: Paper Mountains" lets participants explore the way the shape of the land and the pull of gravity influence how water moves over Earth. By making unique mountain models from crumpled paper and watching how water moves across them,...

Included here are links to each activity training and content training video for the Explore Science: Earth & Space toolkit (2018 and 2017 kits), as well as a link to the entire Explore Science: Earth & Space toolkit video album.

In "Exploring the Solar System: Stomp Rockets," participants learn about how some rockets carry science tools—not scientists—into space, and how a special kind of rocket called "sounding rockets" can be used for quick, low-flying scientific missions into space. Participants will...

"Exploring the Universe: Ice Orbs" is a hands-on activity in which visitors investigate a frozen sphere, trying to learn about objects hidden inside. Participants learn that planetary scientists at NASA are investigating "icy worlds" in the outer solar system, looking...

Welcome to your Explore Science: Earth & Space toolkit! This section contains everything you will need to begin planning and promoting your Earth & Space event. The downloadable planning and promotion guide will walk you through your event. Also included...

Sample press photos for creating your own Explore Science: Earth & Space promotional materials

It can be challenging to know what ideas and experiences learners already have when they visit an informal education venue. What facilitation approaches will help them build productive and deep conceptual learning about Earth and space science? When educators anticipate...

In "Exploring the Solar System: Mars Rovers," participants learn about how scientists and engineers use robotic rovers and other vehicles to explore distant worlds, and experience some of the challenges and teamwork required to navigate a rover across the surface...

"Exploring the Solar System: Big Sun, Small Moon" is a hands-on activity that explores the concept of apparent size and allows visitors to experience this phenomena using familiar objects—a tennis ball and a beach ball. Participants learn that the Sun...

Space telescopes can offer us better, clearer views of the universe (and of our own planet) than Earth-based telescopes can, but getting these large, delicate pieces of equipment into orbit is tricky. In "Exploring the Universe: Pack a Space Telescope,"...

These pinhole projector eclipse postcards allow you to safely observe the North American Total Solar Eclipse on August 21, 2017. The two sided postcard features a map of the contiguous US and what percentage of the eclipse you’ll see at...

This is a collection of logos for creating your own Explore Science: Earth & Space promotional materials (ai, pdf, jpg, and png formats, in both English and Spanish, included). Individual logo files are located in the downloadable zip files.

The "Exploring the Solar System: Magnetic Fields" activity shows participants how scientists can use tools to study the invisible magnetic fields of Earth, the Sun, and other objects in the universe. Participants can see how the Sun's magnetic field extends...

"Exploring the Solar System: Pocket Solar System" is a hands-on activity in which visitors make a scale model of the distances between objects in our solar system. They learn that there is a lot of space between planets, and that...

"Exploring the Universe: Objects in Motion" encourages participants to explore the complex but predictable ways objects in the universe interact with each other. Stars, planets, moons, and other objects in space orbit around each other because of gravity, and NASA...

This is a form for the capture and use of photos, video, and/or audio of visitors at your Explore Science: Earth & Space event. Both pdf and .doc versions are included.