NASA’s Airspace Systems Program and the Ames Research Center are pleased to announce the public release of Smart Skies FlyBy Math: Distance-Rate-Time Problems in Air Traffic Control for Grades 5-9
FlyBy Math brings interactive real-life mathematics applications to grades 5-9 with a series of six Air Traffic Control problems. Using FlyBy Math, students learn to predict air traffic conflicts using distance, rate, and time relationships.
Students assume the roles of pilots, air traffic controllers, and NASA scientists to conduct an experiment and to use guided paper-and-pencil activities to determine the number of seconds it takes each plane to travel a given distance along a jet route. Teachers can assign a variety of mathematics problem-solving methods ranging from counting to plotting points to graphing a system of linear equations.
FlyBy Math reflects teacher feedback from nationwide classroom tests with over 2,000 students. The materials support many National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Standards and Expectations and several National Science Education Standards (NSES).
The instructional materials include: An overall Educator Guide; video clips to introduce air traffic control; and, for each problem, a Teacher Guide for to include answer sheets, student workbooks, and optional pre- and post-tests.
All FlyBy Math materials are free and available to download from the FlyBy Math Web site: http://quest.nasa.gov/projects/smart_skies/
