New NASA Student Navigation Challenge Begins: Exploration through Navigation Challenge: Charting a Course to the Moon

Calling all Explorers:

NASA Quest and the LCROSS mission invite you to register for Part II of the “Exploration through Navigation Challenge: Charting a Course to the Moon”. In this challenge students will be tasked to chart a course from Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida to one of the lunar poles using navigation skills appropriate for outer space. The essential question used to keep students on task is “How do you stay on course?” See: http://quest.nasa.gov/challenges/lcross3/

The “Exploration through Navigation” Challenge is two-part. Part I, “Charting a Course at Sea,” was held in Fall 2008. Though participation in Part I is helpful, it is not required for participation in Part II. The two parts of the challenge complement each other but ultimately stand alone. For Part II of this Challenge, students will submit a navigation plan (as a class) to NASA experts for review. Other activities will include weekly challenge questions (with prizes), an opening and closing webcast, and a chat with the author of “A Man on the Moon.” At the end of the Challenge, students will be invited to compare and contrast methods of navigating on Earth (at sea) and in space.

Registration opens today, and we invite you to visit: http://quest.nasa.gov/challenges/lcross3/register.html for information and links to the registration and Pre-Survey Questionnaire online forms. Please note that we anticipate that educators or adult supervisors will submit the registration and the Pre-Survey Questionnaire. Your complete information on these steps helps us to evaluate the impact of our challenges.

Join us in this exciting adventure that parallels the challenges faced by the LCROSS mission as it departs Earth and travels to the Moon.