Watch a Video: The Space Race Continues!
Discuss: How has human space exploration changed over time?
Students will identify key events in the space race of the 1950s and ‘60s and understand that a new race is on for commercial space travel.
Lesson Plan - Racing Into Space
Learning Objective
Text Structure
Sequence, Comparison
Content-Area Connections
Space Science
Standards Correlations
CCSS: RI.4.1, RI.4.2, RI.4.3, RI.4.4, RI.4.5, RI.4.6, RI.4.7, RI.4.8, RI.4.10, L.4.4, SL.4.1
NGSS: Earth’s Place in the Universe
NCSS: Science, Technology, and Society
TEKS: Science 4.8
1. Preparing to Read
The Space Race Continues
Watch a video to learn more about the space race.
Preview Words to Know
Project the online vocabulary slideshow and introduce the Words to Know.
- commercial
- prosthetic
Set a Purpose for Reading
Note the As You Read question, and have students compare the two space races as they read.
2. Close-Reading Questions
1. What are some differences between the new space race and the original one? The new space race is between companies, while the original one was between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. In the new race, anyone can go into space if they can afford a ticket. In the original race, only trained astronauts could go.
(RI.4.5 COMPARISON)
2. Why does Hayley Arceneaux say that she wouldn’t be able to experience space without SpaceX? Arceneaux has a prosthetic leg. Until companies like SpaceX made commercial space travel available, people going into space had to be “physically perfect.”
(RI.4.1 TEXT EVIDENCE)
3. What clues in the text help you understand the meaning of the word reserve? The article says that people pay to reserve seats on future spaceflights. This suggests that to reserve something is to hold it for future use.
(RI.4.4 WORD MEANING)
3. Skill Building
FEATURED SKILL: Sequence
Use the skill builder “Space Race” to have students identify sequence signal words in the article and put events in order. Download it as Google Slides or a PDF.
(RI.4.3 CONNECTING IDEAS)
Text-to-Speech