Aero Team Answers Your Questions
Browsing answers to questions already asked
An archive of question/answer pairs of
previously asked questions will be maintained and categorized for easy
reference throughout the duration of the project.
Asking the Aero Team your questions
The opportunity to send email questions to the men and women of the
Aero team is available.
We are grateful to the Aerospace Team folks for generously volunteering their time
to support this service. This service is available for K-12 students
who do not have access to libraries with aeronautics texts.
Unfortunately questions regarding homework, science projects and
research projects can not be addressed by our experts.
The sections below will describe some guidelines and procedures for the
process.
K-12 students/teachers and other interested people can email questions to
researchers, engineers
and support staff. This interaction will be supported by a "Smart
Filter" who protects the professional from Internet overload by
acting as a buffer. The actual email addresses of these experts will
remain unlisted. Also, repetitive questions will be answered from an
accumulating database of replies; thus the valued interaction with
the experts will be saved for original questions. (More information
about how you can directly search this database will follow later.)
Tips for asking good questions
Each and every expert is excited about connecting with you. But
it is important to remember that the time and energy of these researchers
is extremely valuable. If possible, please review the materials available
online to gain an overall understanding of the basics.It would be best
to ask questions that are not easily answered elsewhere. For
example,
"What is aeronautics?" would not be an appropriate
question.
For classrooms asking questions:
We recognize that this creates a gray area about whether or not a question
is appropriate. Simply use your best judgment. Since the main idea is to
excite students about the wonders of science and research, please err on
the side of having the students participate. If you are not sure whether
or not to send a question, send it.
Some teachers have used a group dynamic to refine the questions that they
email to experts. For example, after first studying ADTO material, students
divide into groups and create a few questions per group. All of the
questions
are then shared and students are given an opportunity to find answers to
their classmates' questions. Those that remain unanswered are sent to the
ADTO team.
Ideally, the act of sending questions will further engage the student in
their learning. It may help to think back to an early stage of development when
the 3-year-old learns that repeating the word "why" can get parents to do
most of the work in a conversation. The wise parent will try to get
their child
involved by asking "Why do you want to know?" The same is true in the
classroom. Teachers might want to help students learn to ask good
questions. Here are three questions the students might ask themselves as
they submit their questions:
What do I want to know?
Can this information be found in a resource that I could easily
check (such as a school encyclopedia)?
Why do I want to know it? (What will I do with the information?
or How will I use what I learn?)
The last question is the most interesting. Student reflection on why they
want to know something is a very valuable learning experience.
Logistics of sending in questions (address and
format)
Questions will be accepted from now through the duration of the project.
To
submit a question, mail it to the following email address:
We will acknowledge and answer all questions as quickly as possible.
Our goal is to provide a basic acknowledgment immediately. In most
cases we should be able to provide an answer within four weeks.
In the subject field, please put the letters "QA:" before a descriptive
subject. Also, provide a sentence of background information to help the
experts understand the grade level of your students. The following
example
should illustrate this idea.
TO: question-aero@quest.arc.nasa.gov
FROM: your email address
SUBJECT: QA: Advances in technology
Hello,
I am an 8th grader from Rochester, New York. What is the biggest advance
in fighter plane technology that has occurred in the last decade?
Thanks, T. Dogg
One question per message
If you or your class have several questions which are unrelated, we ask
that
you please send each unrelated question in a separate email message rather
than as one message with many different questions. While this may be
inconvenient, it is important because it will help us to keep track of the
questions and ensure that no question remains unanswered. Messages that
do not follow this request will be unnecessarily delayed as we go through
the extra step of splitting up the messages ourselves.
20 question limit
Any individual teacher will be limited to submitting a total of 20
questions every three months. Hopefully this will encourage
more
classroom discussion about what students want to know and will lead to
research done before asking questions.
Searching question/answer pairs
A capability to search
for interesting question/answer pairs is also available. The system relies
on the user choosing one or more keywords related to their interest. Every
existing question/answer pair will be searched to see if it contains the
keywords.
Receiving all question/answer pairs as they get created
A capability has been set up for those people that would like
to receive ongoing email with answers to all of the questions asked.
Each night, one mail message will be sent to those interested. This
message will contain a copy of every question/answer pair generated
that day. If you would like to receive these message, please send
an email to:
listmanager@quest.arc.nasa.gov
In the message body, write these words:
