Messages From Space: The Solar System and Beyond by Kevin Beals and Cary Sneider enables students to begin grappling with the questions scientists must confront when investigating the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
Designed for grades 5-8, the book is based on the collaborative efforts of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Project and UC Berkeley's Lawrence Hall of Science. It offers activities that will help students gain knowledge of astronomy and learn how to distinguish scientific fact from sensationalized fiction.
The unit begins when students attempt to decode a fictitious message from space. Pretending that they are SETI scientists, students analyze where in the solar system and beyond, there may be conditions favorable for life. They investigate how the solar system and planetary systems may have formed, and consider how the solar system fits into a bigger picture of the universe. Throughout, students consider whether life could exist "out there" and, if so, how they might communicate with those life forms.
The teachers' guide includes the details for student activities like creating a tour of solar system, sending messages to aliens (actually teams of students who have to decode them), figuring out what would make another site in the galaxy habitable, and writing science fiction stories about the authors of the fictional message they try to decode.
For more information about the book, which costs $18, contact Great Explorations in Math and Science (GEMS), Lawrence Hall of Science, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-5200; call (510) 642-7771; or visit the Web site [www.lhs.berkeley. edu/gems]
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