Moon project a winner for students
Posted On: Sunday, Dec. 28 2008 08:20 AM
By Todd Martin
Killeen ISD Public InformationAt West Ward Elementary School, outer space is never too far away.
A team of four fifth-graders at the school won a nationwide competition based on an essay they compiled and questions they posed to NASA scientists in a teleconference.
John Caravana, Andrea Velazquez, Min Kim and Aracely Silva conducted research and put together an essay about three of Saturn's moons. Their research prompted curiosity about why tiny Mimas is so small among the planet's 60 moons.
More than 400 schools across the country took part in the Cassini Scientist For a Day contest sponsored by the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
West Ward is a NASA Explorer School and receives resources from the space program.
Science teacher Elliott Alvarado said he was "a bit dazzled" by his four students as they asked questions of NASA scientists and won the finals of the competition, beating out schools from Alaska, California, North Carolina and Virginia.
The West Ward students are part of a group called the NASA Challenge Kids, composed of 12 fifth-graders who meet with Alvarado weekly to be scientifically challenged.
Most recently they worked on astronomically navigating particular stars.
Explaining their award-winning project, the four students easily talked about Mimas and the moons Enceladus and Titan – three terms a lot of college graduates don't know about.
They pointed out that Enceladus is particularly interesting for the presence of water on its surface. A recent scientific article shows an artist's rendition of that moon with geysers spewing liquid into the air.
"It was cool, but nervous," Caravana said of the experience of talking by telephone with scientists on a line with students from four other schools.
The conclusion of the West Ward essay was that NASA should make images of the Mimas moon.
The scientists agreed and used the Cassini space probe to do just that.
Images of the four winning students are to appear on NASA's Web site.
"It's fun and interesting," Velazquez said, listing several topics of discussion, "finding other planets, life on Mars, another moon."
"It's a great experience for them," Alvarado said of the extended lessons on space and the recent competition, adding "they seem to get a lot out of it."
The science teacher at West Ward gets a lot of questions that prompt him to give a lot of challenges.
"They want to know 'is there life on the moon?' I don't know," he said, adding "maybe you'll find out."