Mission to Mars Student Challenge for Summer Camps

This summer, immerse your youth in the exploration of Mars with the Mission to Mars Student Challenge for Summer Camps! A 7-week series of hands-on activities take youth from learning about Mars, planning a mission, launch and landing, and exploring the surface – all while following the Perseverance Rover’s current exploration of Mars!

To help you implement one or more of these activities in your program, this series of one-hour trainings show camp and afterschool leaders how to guide activities from each phase of the challenge. A variety of activity styles from hands-on to online, focusing on the science, engineering, and art of exploring Mars are presented. The focus is on upper elementary and middle school, but with options for younger and older kids.

	January 21/ STEM Enrichment Training – Mission to Mars Student Challenge A walk through of activities featured in the Mission to Mars Student Challenge and how to incorporate them in an out-of-school setting. Watching this is recommended "homework" for any other training! Presentation recording Presentation slides Step-by-step instructions and supply lists for the featured activities: Parachute Design and Make a Straw Rocket
	April 29 / Learn About Mars Both artists and scientists need careful observation skills to interpret and understand the scene being viewed. This STEAM-oriented session grows kids’ skills and their understanding of the surface of Mars using basic concepts of art. Featured activity: Art and the Cosmic Connection: Mars Edition Presentation recording Presentation slides Ingenuity video (slide 13) Materials list: plain white paper your choice of crayons / colored pencils / pens / chalk / pastels / water color
	May 13/ Plan Your Mission What instruments would help you learn more about Mars and answer the questions you are curious about? In this session kids consider what tools to include on a rover, and play a game to design a full mission from launch to landing. Featured activities: What Tools Would You Take to Mars and Marsbound: Mission to the Red Planet Presentation recording Presentation slides as pptx or pdf Materials list: internet-connected device, preferably a tablet or laptop
	May 27/ Design Your Spacecraft Guide kids in gaining the skills to think like an engineer as they construct their own rover and helicopter! Featured activities: Make a Cardboard Rover and Make a Paper Mars Helicopter Presentation recording Presentation slides Materials list: Printed or traced copy of Paper Mars Helicopter template Scissors Paper clip (optional) One 6-inch square of corrugated cardboard Two 5-inch squares of corrugated cardboard 1 sharpened cylindrical pencil 2 rubber bands (>1 inch diameter) 2 pieces of round hard candy with a hole in the middle (or extra cardboard to make wheels) 1 drinking straw (plastic or reusable) Tape
	June 10/ Surface Operations Kids play a board game to move a rover to a spot on Mars where it can study interesting rocks, then learn to think like a scientist to describe rocks made from clay. Featured activity: Mars Rover Driver Board Game and Describe Rocks Like a NASA Scientist Presentation recording Materials list: internet-connected device, preferably a tablet or laptop
	June 17/ Sample Handling Get your tech on and code in Scratch to address rover and helicopter challenges. No coding experience needed! Featured activities will be an assortment of Scratch programming challenges Presentation recording Presentation slides Scratch: https://scratch.mit.edu/ Materials list: internet-connected device, preferably a tablet or laptop
	July 15 / Mid-summer check-in Opportunity for Out of School Time educators to share best practices and get questions answered about challenge implementation. Presentation slides Presentation recording

Live webinars let your kids learn directly from JPL scientists and engineers discussing their STEM careers!

Wednesday, June 23rd at 10:30am Pacific / Learn About Mars
Joey Jefferson, Mars 2020 Lead Deep Space Network Scheduler
Recording

Tuesday, June 29th at 10 am Pacific /Plan Your Mission
Elio Morillo, Mars 2020 System Testbed Engineer
Recording

Thursday, July 8th at 10:30am Pacific/ Build Your Spacecraft
Keri Bean, Mars 2020 Helicopter Integration Engineer
Recording

Wednesday, July 14th at 10am Pacific/ Launch to Mars
John Callas, Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager
Recording

Monday, July, 19th at 10am Pacific/ Land on Mars
Dr. Ota Lutz, K-12 Education Lead at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Recording

Tuesday, July 27th at 10am Pacific/ Surface Operations
Claire Newman, Mars 2020 Research Scientist
Recording

KEY LINKS

See or submit student work at Mission to Mars Student Showcase
Learn about more online Education events at the Events Calendar
Mission to Mars Student Challenge homepage
Kids' webinars series page, for easy sharing (no educator-only content)

Also, check out these summer camp-targeted Mission to the Moon trainings and more summer resources from NASA STEM Engagement

This special resource has been made available to all viewers. Please note that (free) membership is required for full access to the Museum & Informal Education Alliance site; please visit Join Our Community to learn more.

Resource Type:

Education Activities

NASA Resources

Topic:

Aeronautics Research

Mars

Mission:

Mars 2020