Celebrate Hour of Code and

Computer Science Education Week

The Annual Hour of Code celebration will introduce millions of students to computer science using fun tutorials that show that anyone can learn to code. This spotlight on coding coincides with Computer Science Education Week, Dec. 4-10. Each year, this event inspires K-12 students to learn computer science and advocates for equity in computer science education.

Launch your celebration with NASA computer science educational resources.

Make a Binary Bracelet

Grades K-8

NASA's Space Jam: Make Music With Code

Grades K-12

Coding a Radio Message for Space

Grades 5-12

Test your knowledge of computer science at NASA with this interactive Kahoot! quiz.

Click here for even more coding activities and lesson ideas.

Computer Science Week is a global initiative celebrated every year to promote computer science education and encourage students to pursue careers in technology. During this week, thousands of Hourof Code events are organized worldwide.

You can visit code.org to learn how to extend the Hour of Code beyond school hours and explore the wide range of events happening worldwide. 

The December solstice, which falls on December 21st, brings the longest night and shortest day of the year for locations in the northern hemisphere.

This phenomenon is known as the Winter Solstice. You can celebrate this special day with a fun STEM Challenge that is both educational and entertaining. NASA offers a great STEM Challenge that you can participate in by visiting their website.

Join us in celebrating the Winter Solstice and exploring the wonders of science and technology with the STEM Challenge.

ACTIVITIES

Gingerbread House STEM Challenge

How easy or difficult is it to build a gingerbread house? It depends on what you want your house to look like. Design possibilities are almost endless! You could make a multi-story building, try different shapes and sizes, or add extra features such as a balcony or chimney. The more complex your design gets, the more difficult it is to make sure that your house stays upright and keeps its shape. In this activity, you will become an engineer and design and build a gingerbread house that must… Read more

6 STINKING COOL FACTS ABOUT DOG NOSES

Did you know that dogs can use their cold, wet (and cute!) noses to sense sources of heat and thermal radiation? That discovery, via a 2020 study from Sweden that challenged dogs to choose between a warm and cool object across a room, makes them only the second mammal known to possess that superpower. (The other is a vampire bat.)

And that’s not all dogs' noses can do. Read on for six reasons why dog noses are among nature’s most amazingly engineered instruments—instruments whose power humans are now trying to recreate:

1. Dogs' sense of smell is between 10,000 and 100,000 times as potent as humans’. This power comes in part from the up to 300 million olfactory receptors dogs carry around in their noses, compared to our mere 6 million. And the part of the canine brain that is dedicated to smells is 40 times larger than ours, proportionally speaking.

2. Dogs can smell continuously, even while they’re breathing in and out. In contrast, when a human smells a scent (sniffs a rose, for example) we inhale that odor and breathe in oxygen through the same passage. But if a dog smells the same flower, air “splits into two different flow paths, one for olfaction and one for respiration," Brent Craven, a Pennsylvania State University bioengineer who has modeled canine olfaction anatomy using high-resolution MRIs, told NOVA.

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