SKY IS THE LIMIT

No journey is long, when dreams are big and sky is the limit.

This activity aimed at giving the students a first taste of space and space exploration. NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida hosted the students for Camp KSC. During the camp the students were engaged in hands-on activities to get a feel of the excitement of NASA's missions and programs. By identifying challenges and proposing solutions to actual space-related situations, the students gained experience in science, technology and engineering. They also learnt how using those skills could be rewarding and fun.

A major component of the camp was letting students use simulators to further understand space travel.

One simulation allowed the students to pretend they were participating in a spacewalk using a Micro-G wall. For the Micro-G simulator, they slipped into a harness system that counterbalanced their own body weight and allowed them to effortlessly move up and down the wall (simulating the freedom of movement experienced during a spacewalk). Getting to ride on the multi-axis trainer, MAT, allowed the students to experience the feeling of a tumbling space capsule.

To add to their knowledge of spaceflight, the students learnt about astronauts and space missions and met with astronaut Mike Mullane who answered their queries about living in space and space missions.

Once back in school, the students :

• Conducted assemblies to disseminate the knowledge acquired at the Space camp with the rest of the school
• Prepared and presented a slide show on the topic ‘Living in Space”
• Researched America’s space program and Star Wars.
• Did a comparative study of space programs of NASA and ISRO
• Interviewed Dr Sugata Kaviraj, an Astrophysicist from the Imperial College, London on Skype. Dr. Kaviraj answered the students’ queries related to space and his research in this field.