Click on first image for video to see 
how we designed, decorated and launched our own AWESOME rockets and launcher and learned about water cycles in the Ocean this week. WHY?
Rocket that Launched Aquarius Satelitte
Back in June NASA and 5 other countries’ space programs (including Argentina) launched an United Launch Alliance (ULA) Rocket called AQUARIUS. A considerable posse of M&B homeschoolers went to the Vanderberg Airforce Base in Lompoc to witness the Aquarius launch. Due to fog, these families witnessed more with their ears than their eyes.
Well now Aquarius has been in orbit around our Planet Earth long enough to have sent home some data (see image below). What was its mission? To confirm the salinity of our World’s Oceans.
Salinity means the amount of salt in a solution. Funny to consider the Ocean as a solution, but it is. And as our world is experiencing global warming the oceans are changings. Polar ice caps are melting adding salt-free water into the ocean. This and pollution going into our Oceans are changing the Water Cycles of Our Planet and the well-being of the animals, which includes us Humans, who live on it.
Aquarius Satellite
By getting accurate information about our Oceans, scientists can make more accurate predictions and hopefully get closer to healing our Oceans and the ecosystems that rely on them.
The kids will get a more intimate look at Water Cycles and activate their innate conservationist’s spirit as we learn about just how related we all our to such ecosystems and Biomes. (Click to see the parkday where we created our own mini biomes - a great wintertime activity).
…..Our Oceans spread the warmth around the globe when the sun can’t. I will be explaining how salty the water is will determine how warm your town is yearlong. Change the current and you change the weather for the world.Click on these pictures to get a better understanding. Sharing this with your kids will bring up more questions than answers. Parents of homeschool children do not fear, this curiosity will launch your kids into discovering by their own motivation. As I see it, our job is to facilitate just that kind of intense question asking in order to set them loose finding the answers online, in the library or on a blanket in front of someone like me.
