National Aeronautics and Space Administration

This page contains a complete collection of books and other Space Math products in PDF format, which are available to download. Note the large file sizes! Also, these documents are full-color, and contain additional explanatory materials about the content and how the topics align with national mathematics and science standards identified by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the National Science Teachers Association.

These books include most of the weekly math problems assembled by year or by special topic area, in a format that may be more convenient for the teacher than the individual weekly problem downloads. All books contain problems for a mixture of grade levels from 4th through 8th and beyond.

The links below take you to the PDF files.

Annual Math Problem Collections

Special Topic Guides

Additional Math Resources

IMAGE Mission

1. Northern Lights and Solar Sprites (Grades 1-5) Many different areas in solar and space science are covered in highly interactive exercises. These include studying convection on the Sun, solar flares, how to design a rocket payload, and the general subject of how the Sun affects the Earth. It was specifically designed to fill a well-known gap in NASA's offerings for the lower grades, and to do so in a way that is both fun, and well-integrated with national science benchmarks and standards.
2. Solar Storms and You! (Grades 7-9) This series of six workbooks has been adopted in a number of school districts in Maryland, California and Illinois. POETRY has also participated in numerous conferences and workshops, presenting selected activities to teachers. The six chapters are: Solar Activity | The Solar Wind | Magnetic Storms | Aurora | Satellite Design | Human Impacts
3. Blackout: The Video (Grades 7-9)A middle school-level science module in the Event-Based Science program supported by the National Science Foundation. The workbook I will be published by Addison-Wesley in early 2000. It is a role-based curriculum package that lets students operate as engineers, scientists and technicians to understand the cause of a simulated electrical power blackout patterned after the March 1989 Quebec blackout which affected 6 million people. Students read news stories about the impacts of blackouts, their scientific causes, and conduct hands-on experiments in electricity and magnetism.To order a copy, contact: Request Coordination Center , Code 633, Goddard Space Flight Center , 301) 286-6695 (Email) request@nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov Cost = $10.00 Length: 20 minutes The Video may also be ordered through NASA/CORE by visiting their Web Page
4. IMAGE Explores... (Grades 7-10) A series of 1-page NASA Education Briefs that contain information about a specific IMAGE instrument or technology issue on the front page. On the back of the page, there is a classroom activity that students can work on that picks up on some aspect of the main essay. Typical activities may exercise geometric skills, algebraic manipulation, or graphing. The Plasmasphere | The Aurora | The Magnetosphere | The Ring Current
5. Exploring the Earth's Magnetic Field(Grades 9-11)This is a workbook of 23 activities spanning the needs of K-12 teachers who want to discuss Earth's magnetism in varying degrees of detail. In includes web-based activities, and a variety of hands-on experiments with magnets and electromagnetism.
6. The Classroom Magnetometer (Grades 7-10)Students will build and operate a simple magnetometer using a soda bottle and a bar magnet. They will use it to monitor changes in Earth's magnetic field. They will study magnetic storms and investigate their properties in time and space. They will make measurements and perform simple statistical analysis.
7. The Instruments of IMAGE(Grades 10-12)This is a pair of high school-level workbooks featuring advanced problems in mathematics and science that are based on experiments being performed with the IMAGE satellite. Introduction Guide | Spacecraft and Data
8. Tracking a Solar Storm(Grades 10-12)This is a pair of high school-level workbooks featuring advanced problems in mathematics and science that are based on experiments being performed with the IMAGE satellite. Part 1 | Part 2
9. The Northern Lights(Grades 7-8)This is a workbook of 10 activities targeted at Grade 7-8 that explores the Northern Lights. The activities include essays, triangulation, parallax, geometry, calculator mathematics, graph analysis, prediction and forecasting.
10. Exploring Space Science Mathematics(Grades 7-9)This series of math activities will help students understand some of the real-life applications of mathematics in the study of the Sun and Earth as a system.
11. Calculating the Distance to the Sun During a Transit of Mercury using Satellite Observations of Parallax (Grades 9-10)This is a geometry problem that teaches students about the parallax effect and how it is used to determine distances in space. In this example, we use images from the TRACE satellite taken during the Transit of Mercury to measure the parallax angle, and determine the distance from Earth to the Sun.
12. Calculating the Distance to the Sun During a Transit of Venus using Satellite Observations of Parallax (Grades 9-10)This is a geometry problem that teaches students about the parallax effect and how it is used to determine distances in space. In this example, we use images from the TRACE satellite taken during the rare, 2004 Transit of Venus to measure the parallax angle, and determine the distance from Earth to the Sun.