It Doesn’t Get Much Cooler Than Astronauts Reading Kids Stories From Space
If you’ve hit a wall and cannot bear to bring yourself to read one more Llama Llama book, then this is right up your alley. The Global Space Education Foundation has the coolest program called Story Time from Space. And yes, it’s exactly what it sounds like! Astronauts on the International Space Station reading kids books, then editing and sharing the videos. Of astronauts reading to your kids. FROM SPACE. It doesn’t matter how many of the voices you can do from Green Eggs and Ham. You will NEVER be as cool as an astronaut floating in zero gravity while they read your kid a story.
Story Time from Space was developed by Patricia Tribe and Alvin Drew. Tribe is the former director of education at Space Center Houston. And Drew was the first NASA astronaut to read a story in space for the program, during the final mission of the space shuttle Discovery!
Tribe and Drew were looking for a way to encourage kids to read, while also promoting STEM education. And thus, the idea of Story Time from Space was born. The books read by the astronauts are science-based, like Rosie Revere, Engineer and Max Goes to Mars. The astronauts doing the readings are actual on-duty astronauts at the Internation Space Station as it hurtles around the planet at 17,500 miles an hour. Just floating around up there, reading kids books. The video of astronaut Kathleen Rubins reading Rosie Revere is incredible!
Besides promoting reading and STEM education, the program puts a lot of emphasis on diversity. Japanese engineer and JAXA astronaut Koichi Wakata read Max Goes to the International Space Station in Japanese!
The program is rapidly expanding with more book selections and even science experiments! Story Time from Space is currently working on adding nine simple science experiments for kids. The experiments were all conducted from space, and cover concepts like energy transfer and surface tension. And remember, zero gravity!
Seriously, this is blowing MY mind, I cannot even imagine how stoked my kids are going to be.
(Image: YouTube/Story Time From Space)
