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Splash page Teacher page

Welcome page

Offline formath activity

Situation 1:Taxiing and Takeoff

Intro to story

Situation 2:Enroute

Situation 3:Landing

Story ends

Offline formath activity

Offline formath activity

Story continues

Story continues

NASA Movie 1

NASA Movie 2

NASA Movie 3

Congrats/exit page

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Teacher Page• Links to standards

• Lesson plans

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Welcome Page• Some sort of intro to the students…maybe the story just

starts?

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Story/Narrative• Story is in a comic book style, with realistic pictures accompanied by

text bubbles.

• Narrative text will appear above or in scenes

• No audio text

• Flight attendant introduces NASA movies

• ELL considerations– 10 word vocabulary list with English and Spanish audio definitions

– Any vocabulary word used in text will be clickable to bring up vocab page

• Info icon (brain w/sunglasses) will serve as a link for students to click on to get more information/mini-articles– Number of “pass-offs” between air traffic controllers in a single flight

– Hub and spoke system

– Anything else we can think of

JIBBA JABBA

MEANWHILE…

MEANWHILE…

SOMETHING INTERESTING

Click me!

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Story/Narrative• Story outline:– Students are from Detriot and are going to compete in an extreme sports event in Santa Cruz over spring

break– They must take airplanes to get there– The current air transportation system has problems and could delay them

• They need to make their connecting flight in Denver• They need to catch the bus from San Jose to Santa Cruz• They need to get to the extreme sports event on time

– Some of the problems they encounter• Taxiing around the airport for takeoff takes a long time because it’s crowded and complicated to move on the airport’s

surface• A bad weather system obstructs their flight path en route• Foggy weather and crowded conditions force their aircraft to circle in a holding pattern around the airport waiting to

land

– Sports characters• Surfer• Rollerblader• Free-style bicycle/bike racer• Rock climber• Hot dog eater• Skateboarder• Boogyboarder• volleyball

– Personalities• Realist• Hyperanxious• Food eater• Intellectual• Space case/mellow (probably the surfer)• Smart alec

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Scene 1: Meeting up in the airport• Start with an exterior picture of the Detroit airport

– Our story begins…

• Go to a scene inside the airport near the ticketing area. The students begin to arrive and meet up.

– Students greet each other as they arrive. Each is carrying sports equipment because they haven’t checked in yet.

– Things to be established in this scene:• The different characters and personalities• They are going to compete in an extreme sports event in Santa Cruz over spring break.• How they know each other (school, extreme sports club, etc.)• They fly into San Jose with a layover in Denver, and then have to catch a bus to Santa Cruz• Its cold and snowy in Detroit

– Sorry I’m late. It took me forever to shovel the snow out off my driveway! Can’t wait to get to sunny California!

Scene 2: On the way to and at the gate• Picture of long lines at ticketing counter

– After check in…

• Go to a scene of kids walking towards gate.– Flight 244 for Denver and then on to San Jose now boarding.– Hungry kid trying to get some food from vendor on the way. Other kids tell him to hurry up!– Kids are excited.

– We are outta here!– Let’s go!– Yeah!

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Scene 3: On the aircraft, taxiing and takeoff• Picture of aircraft on crowded airport surface

– On the runway…

• Go to a scene of kids in airplane.– Airplane keeps driving around on the taxiways. It’s taking forever because there are a lot of aircraft and its

complicated for them to move around.– This is taking FOREVER! Are we DRIVING to Denver?

– Captain says:– Good morning passengers. There’s a bit of a delay getting of the ground. We are 14th in line for takeoff. We should be off the ground

in about 35 minutes.» Opportunity for a mini-article link about crowded airports and future capacity issues?

– Kids are concerned and check their itinerary• Smart girl calculates how much time they have to catch the connecting flight.

– We’re supposed to arrive at 11:22 am. Our connecting flight leaves at 12:55. If we’re 35 minutes late, then we will have exactly 58 minutes to get there.

• Hyperanxious kid gets nervous– Oh my gosh! Are we gonna make it? Oh no! What if we miss it? What are we going to do?

• Surfer kid only worrying about the waves, imagining to himself– Dude, I wonder what the waves are like in Santa Cruz right now

• Hungry kid trying to get snacks from flight attendant– Excuse me. Can I get some pretzels over here?

• Hyperanxious kid– Uh, okay, but I’m still worried. What’s the problem anyways?

• Smart girl– Here’s what’s going on…

– Click on the smart girl to get an explanation of the problem and the math involved. Students then go offline for activity.

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Scene 4: Come back from offline; NASA movie; on the aircraft• Back on the aircraft

– Flight attendant shows up and shows the NASA movie, via the in-flight movie screen– Welcome back! NASA is working on ways to reduce the delays experienced on the runway. Click the play button.– NASA movie plays. After movie, the Next button takes them back to the story.

• Show picture of plane taking off• Kids are talking on the airplane• Turbulence hits the aircraft

– Things are flying all over the place– Hungry kid reaches for the barf bag– Hyperanxious kid gets nervous

• Captain comes on and announces bad weather delay– Sorry folks. There is extensive thunderstorm activity between here and Denver. Our flight is being diverted. This will delay

our arrival time by 20 minutes.– Kids are concerned and check their itinerary

• Smart girl calculates how much time they have to catch the connecting flight.– Our flight has already been delayed by 35 minutes. If we’re another 25 minutes late, that leaves us only 33 minutes to get to our connecting flight!

• Hyperanxious kid gets nervous– Oh my gosh! Are we gonna make it? Oh no! What if we miss it? What are we going to do?

• Realist kid– Hey guys. Don’t freak out. It might be close, but if we hurry, we might make it in 33 minutes.

• Surfer kid imagines himself surfing on airplane wing– Dude, this turbulence feels like an awesome wave

• Hyperanxious kid– Uh, okay, but I’m still worried. What’s the problem anyways?

• Smart girl– Here’s what’s going on…

– Click on the smart girl to get an explanation of the problem and the math involved. Students then go offline for activity.

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Scene 5: Come back from offline; NASA movie; ready for landing• Back on the aircraft

– Flight attendant shows up and shows the NASA movie, via the in-flight movie screen– Welcome back! NASA is working on ways to reduce the delays caused by bad weather. Click the play

button.– NASA movie plays. After movie, the Next button takes them back to the story.

• Show aircraft landing• Show students coming out of gate• They are running to get to the next flight

– Hungry kid tries to get some food– Smart alec kid gets mad at the surfer kid

• When you bought the tickets, why didn’t you just get us a direct flight?

– Realist kid agrees• Yeah! What’s up with that?

– Surfer says• Guys, I tried! There were no direct flights. This is as good as it gets!

– Smart girl• He’s right. The way our current airspace system is set up, there are very few direct flights available

– Opportunity for hub and spoke article

• They continue to race through the airport and barely make their flight– We made it!– I hope our equipment does!

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• Show pics of aircraft taking off and enroute– Later…

• Kids are back on plane. The flight attendant has a big moustache, and is wondering what happened to all the peanuts

– Hey! Does that flight attendant look familiar?– Hungry kid has huge pile of peanuts in front of him

• Captain announces another delay– Attention passengers. Because of the thunderstorm, most flights are arriving at the same time. We need to

circle the airport and await our turn to land. We are being delayed for 18 minutes.

• Kids worry about catching the bus to Santa Cruz. They check their itinerary– Smart girl calculates

• Uggs! That only gives us 20 minutes to get our luggage and catch the last bus to Santa Cruz!

– Surfer seems grim and imagines a picture of waves with a big line through them.– Hyperanxious kid panics again– Smart girl explains what the problem is and introduces the math problem.

• Kids go offline for math activity.

Scene 6: After takeoff and enroute; ready for second landing

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Scene 7: Come back from offline; NASA movie; landing at San Jose• Back on the aircraft

– Flight attendant shows up and shows the NASA movie, via the in-flight movie screen– Welcome back! Learn how NASA is working to decrease delays during landing. Click the play button.– NASA movie plays. After movie, the Next button takes them back to the story.

• Show picture of plane landing• Kids waiting in line in the crowded airplane aisle, looking at their watches.• Kids running through airport to get luggage• They get their bags, their equipment is there• They dash to catch the bus. Busdriver is the flight attendant in disguise• Picture of a bus driving away. All six thought bubbles go to a common phrase:

– We’re outta here!!!

Scene 8: Arrive in Santa Cruz and epilogue• Kids are all standing on the beach with their equipment and smiles on their faces

– There’s got to be an easier way.– You mean we gotta go back?!

• Flight attendant is in disguise somewhere in the scene… judge? Walking on the beach?• Each kid’s epilogue shows them either competing, or on the roller coaster, or having some other

“vacation-y shot” postcard-like– A description tells what happened to each kid– I.e. the surfer goes to UC Santa Cruz and becomes a marine biologist/oceanographer

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Movie 1:Taxiing and Takeoff

• Managing aircraft moving on the surface of an airport is a complicated job. Aircraft are landing, moving to gates, pulling away from gates, loading and unloading luggage, and traveling to the runways for takeoff. In doing so, they must navigate across active runways and avoid other aircraft trying to get to their destinations. In addition, all these actions are affected by weather patterns, delayed flights, and changes in flight schedules. Currently, all this movement is overseen by air traffic controllers in the control towers located at the airport. A lot of this work is conducted by the air traffic controllers visually watching the aircraft and making quick and careful decisions on how to direct each aircraft to move. These controllers must know exactly where all aircraft are, where they are going, and how they are moving. The controllers tell the aircraft how to navigate through the maze of pathways at the airport. A lot of the time, this can be overwhelming and stressful for everyone—not only the air traffic controllers, but also the passengers and pilots who may need to wait to begin or end their flight.

• Fortunately, NASA is working on a solution to this situation. The program is called Advanced Surface Automation, or ASA. The ASA program is designed to help air traffic controllers manage the aircraft moving around an airport’s surface, while reducing delays and increasing efficiency and safety. Researchers for the ASA program are designing a suite of software that will take over some of the low level tasks that air traffic controllers currently do, such as basic taxiing and take-off of departing aircraft, and the gate approach of arriving aircraft. The software will display this information so air traffic controllers can get a picture of the airport traffic at a glance. This will allow the air traffic controllers to concentrate on high level tasks like overseeing and improving the airport’s overall traffic volume, and making more complicated decisions based on unpredictable events, such as managing and giving clearances for special circumstances like emergency landings or flight changes.

• The ASA software is designed to predict, automate, and coordinate airport traffic on the ground. It will constantly monitor all aircraft movement to make sure that there are no problems. Additionally, it will be able to predict what the airport surface traffic will look like in the near future. If potential problems do arise, the software will use powerful computers to calculate new paths for the aircraft involved. In some cases, the air traffic controller will take over and solve the problem herself. The ASA software system is designed to learn from itself by keeping an extensive log of all activities and self-diagnosing any issues. The software will also take care of coordinating the surface traffic with the commercial aircraft companies and the air traffic controllers. Eventually, the ASA system is designed to handle movement at many airports and the airspace surrounding them. With state-of-the-art technology like ASA, our country’s airports will become safer and more efficient, while ensuring the air traffic controllers have powerful support tools to help them do their jobs.

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Movie 2:En route

• As aircraft travel across the country, they move through the hands of many different air traffic controllers. The air traffic controllers make sure that all the aircraft in the sky can get safely to their destinations, while avoiding other aircraft, severe weather, or restricted airspace. Currently, air traffic controllers issue flight clearances and instructions verbally to all aircraft in their airspace. This is a huge task, especially if flight plans need to change. And when things get really busy, special requests from pilots, like non-emergency route changes, must be set aside.

• NASA is creating a variety of technologies that will help controllers and pilots alike manage high traffic situations and unforeseen obstacles, like bad weather. The NASA programs will create systems that can increase the number of clearances issued by air traffic controllers 10 times! The research includes software, flight instruments, and displays onboard the aircraft and on the ground at the air traffic control centers. With these technologies, pilots will have more control. Instead of calling an air traffic controller over the radio, pilots will directly input the flight paths they want to travel into the computers onboard the aircraft. The computers and communication equipment will send those requests to the ground control systems, which will ensure there are no conflicts with any other aircraft. Once the flight plan is approved, it is sent back to the aircraft. The pilot will then begin flying the new course. The ground system will constantly monitor the movements of all the aircraft in the area and will upload new routes to the aircraft if any problems arise. This allows the air traffic controllers more flexibility with responding to special requests from pilots or managing unusual situations. At any time, the controller can take manual control of an aircraft at her discretion or if the pilot requests it.

• NASA is also looking at technologies that give even more control to the pilots and aircraft they fly. In this scenario, pilots can choose to manage their own flight paths without having to talk with the air traffic controller. With the help of special software and cockpit displays onboard the aircraft, they can safely manage their routes, even in reduced flight visibility. Using air-to-air data links, the pilots and their aircraft computer systems will know the locations and plans of all nearby aircraft, allowing each aircraft to devise a safe plan for themselves that avoids other aircraft and meets their own flight goals in the best way. This approach allows many, many more aircraft to fly in the airspace because the job of keeping aircraft apart is spread around to each aircraft, rather than shouldered by just the air traffic controller. In addition to reducing the workloads of air traffic controllers as more aircraft enter the skies, this approach can also improve flight efficiency in bad weather. For instance, in a bad storm, air traffic controllers usually redirect all aircraft in a similar route around the weather system. Moving all the aircraft in one large path around the storm helps prevent an unreasonable amount of work for the controller, but isn’t always the most efficient method for the aircraft. Aircraft with the ability to control their own routes can choose the best path for their situation and help alleviate the large workload for the controllers, all the while keeping on schedule.

• These revolutionary NASA concepts and technologies will open up the airspace system to many more aircraft, lighten the tremendous workloads on air traffic controllers, reduce the number of delays in our airspace, and increase the safety of our skies.

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Movie 3:Landing and Formation Flying

• Large numbers of aircraft delays occur during landing. Why? Because there are many arriving aircraft, but only a limited amount of runways. Landing on the runway can be delayed by, among other things, bad weather, route changes, or the need to properly space each aircraft so the rough air they create doesn’t disrupt the aircraft around them. Just like driving on the freeway in rush hour, these “traffic jams in the sky” will only get worse if we don’t find a solution to the problem.

• You might consider building more runways or more airports. Unfortunately, it’s not that easy. It’s very difficult to expand a current airport, because most airports are located close to cities, and there just isn’t enough room. And nearby residents will be concerned about increased noise due to more aircraft and closer runways. Building new airports is even harder. There isn’t much open space left around city areas to build new airports, plus studies must be conducted to ensure that a new facility does not harm the environment. Finally, new runways and new airports are really expensive.

• Most of the time, the need to have a certain amount of space between aircraft is the primary factor affecting how many aircraft can land on a runway. When preparing to land, all the aircraft must assemble into a long line. Each aircraft needs to be spaced at a certain distance so that the air stream they travel in doesn’t interfere with the safety of the flight. If you’ve ever been on a boat, you know not to get too close to any boat in front of you because of the waves it creates. Those waves make it difficult to steer the boat and makes for a very bumpy ride. Aircraft create a similar situation in the air that can’t always be seen. If aircraft are not spaced properly they could also have bumpy rides or even unsafe flying conditions.

• Different aircraft require different spacing distances and times. While one aircraft may require less spacing than another one, coordinating the different spacings for a long line of aircraft could be overwhelming. Currently, air traffic controllers on the ground are the ones who determine the spacing for the landing aircraft, and they relay that information to the pilots. Most of the time, they must average the spacing between aircraft because the calculations needed to customize spacings for each and every aircraft become too complicated for the limited amount of time they have.

• NASA is working on an alternative solution to the crowded runway problem. Instead of creating new airports or new runways, NASA researchers in the Terminal Area Concepts program (or TAC) are finding ways to increase the number of aircraft that can use the existing runways. One of the solutions they are creating is a set of software that can automatically calculate individual spacings for each aircraft. The software gives instructions about the direction and speed each aircraft needs to travel to get in line and stay in line for landing.

• It’s not just the spacing in the front and back of each aircraft that needs to be obeyed. Safe distances must also be maintained on the sides of each aircraft, so that adjacent aircraft are not too close side-by-side. Ideally, if the weather and visibility are good, then aircraft can land side-by-side on closely-spaced parallel runways, but if the weather is bad, they cannot. Bad weather means larger spacings between aircraft and can reduce the number of landing aircraft by as much as 50%. NASA is creating auto-land software and devices for aircraft that will calculate safe distances between aircraft landing on parallel runways in bad weather. The auto-land systems will also allow airports to build and use new runways between existing runways that are far apart, minimizing environmental impact and land use. The software that TAC is developing for these projects is able to do many complex calculations very fast. The aircraft will be equipped with communication devices that send out information about its direction, speed, location, and spacing needs. The software and equipment will take that information from all the aircraft in the area and come up with a plan routing every aircraft to its most efficient position for landing. The plan will be relayed automatically to the pilots and the air traffic controllers through the software. If a pilot needs to change the flight path of an aircraft, or if weather requires a new plan, the software will recalculate the scenario and provide updated route and spacing information.

• The TAC software will give more control to pilots because they can adjust their routes efficiently and safely, without creating more work for air traffic controllers. Air traffic controllers will also see benefits from this software, as it will allow them to oversee and manage the arrival streams, rather than be burdened with cumbersome and complex route calculations. Additionally, it will reduce the amount of radio communication between pilots and air traffic controllers. Finally, saving a couple seconds here and there doesn’t sound like much, but if you add it all together, it means a lot. A 5% increase in the efficiency of a runway can reduce the delay times by as much as 29%—nearly one-third. As a result of this software, the public will appreciate fewer flight delays within a safer and more efficient airspace system.

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Congrats/exit• Students receive some sort of recognition for their efforts