Picture of the Nina's Recreation, which explains the American flag!
Photo courtesy of The Columbus Foundation

Part One
Choose an explorer from Column A and an explorer from Column B.
A
B
Christopher Columbus
Neil Armstrong
Marco Polo
Jacque Cousteau
Amerigo Vespucci
John Glenn

How were they alike? How were they different?
Go to Google , a search tool, on the Internet
to find information to answer these questions:

1.. Why did they explore what they did? What were their motives? What did they hope to accomplish?
2. What personality traits did they show that demonstrated that they were going to be successful? What kind of person were they?
3. Did they accomplish what they hoped to do? How were they successful?
4. What failures did they have?
5. Did their explorations change the world in any way? If so, how?

Fill in the Microsoft Word Worksheet

(If you have trouble finding all the information needed, click on the explorers' names above. Do this after you searched the Internet on your own.)
 

Part Two
Pretend that you are the head of N.A.S.A. and want to fund a trip to Europa, a moon of Jupiter, because there is strong evidence that it contains water, and therefore, may also have some life forms. This will be a journey that will take many years, and is very dangerous. There is also a strong possibility that the crew may discover a wealth of minerals that would benefit us greatly.

Write out a job description of the type of person that you would want to hire to lead this exploration. Include the personality traits that are important for an explorer to have to be successful, based on your research.

Part Three
Would you like to go on this journey to Europa? Why or why not? What characteristics of explorers do you have? Which are you lacking? Write your decision in paragraph form. Give supporting reasons for your decision.

Webpage Created by
Jill Dembsky
Updated 9/2006

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