INTRODUCTION

Within students' lifetimes, routine space travel and even colonization of other bodies in the solar system will likely become realities, ushering in a new era of human history as well as bringing up a variety of complex issues. How can we use history as a window into this future? How can we help students think critically about the future, and thus prepare themselves for participating in it responsibly?

PROJECT OVERVIEW

In this project, students create TimeLiner slideshows depicting the "history" of space exploration and colonization, as seen from the point of view of the year 2057, one hundred years after the launch of Sputnik 1. These slideshows are based on research on the history of space exploration, virtual experiences of a future scenario in Decisions, Decisions: Colonization, and thoughtful consideration of experts' prognoses on the future of humans in space.

Phase 1: Researching the history and future of space exploration

Begin the project with a discussion of space exploration, eliciting students' knowledge of past events as well as their views of what will happen in the future.

Ask students, working in groups of three to five, to research the history of space exploration, from 1957 to the present day. They can use World Book Encyclopedia, American History Online, ready-made TimeLiner timelines, and Internet resources to become familiar with significant events and to build a basic understanding of trends and changes over time (see Background Information). Groups can use TimeLiner to record their research findings and organize event-based information and multimedia elements for later use in Phase 3.

Once groups have a grasp of what has happened so far in the area of space exploration, they search the Internet, World Book Encyclopedia, and library resources for information on what experts are saying about the future of space exploration.

Phase 2: Experiencing possible futures

As groups are conducting their research, invite them to take turns exploring the space colonization scenario in Decisions, Decisions: Colonization. In the simulation, students learn about the issues that will shape the future of space exploration, and begin to see how certain decisions may lead humanity down different roads.

Phase 3: Predicting the future as history

Invite groups to imagine that they are historians of the future, charged with creating presentations that chronicle the "history" of space exploration from 1957 (the launch of Sputnik 1) to 2057. Each group uses what it has learned and gathered in Phases 1 and 2 to put together TimeLiner timelines that will be shown as slideshows in Phase 4. The slideshows will begin with actual history, and then progress, seamlessly, into predictions treated as if they were historical events, from the perspective of the year 2057.

Phase 4: Sharing and evaluating predictions

Each group, its members still posing as future historians, presents its slideshow to the class. Audience members, acting as students of the future, take careful notes and ask questions that push presenters in the direction of explaining the "whys" of their versions of space exploration "history."

Conclude the project by asking individual students (now grounded in the present) to evaluate each slideshow in writing, and to choose one of the scenarios as the most likely or realistic, and defend that choice.