• The MOON Project electronically links together approximately a dozen "research buddies." One of the buddies, the group leader, is a collegiate pre-service teacher and the rest are elementary or middle schoolers in states such as Massachusetts, Texas, Alaska, California, Indiana, Arizona and New Mexico (on the Navajo Reservation) in the United States and from other countries such as Australia, England, Finland, St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Ukraine.

• Each semester 300-500 children in grades 4-8 and 25-40 pre-service teachers participate in these discussion groups.  Teachers are always welcome to have a small handful or all of their students become research buddies by contacting the project director (see below).
  

• "Research buddies" observe the Moon for 16 weeks and for the last six of those 16 weeks communicate via the Internet to compare observations and figure out why the Moon is behaving as it does.

• "Research buddies" also exchange information about what people in their communities think about the Moon as revealed in their conversation, literature, art, dance and song.

• The MOON Project started in 2001 at Ball State University with Ohio State University becoming a partner soon thereafter.  In 2004 Texas Tech University and Indiana University - Purdue University at Columbus joined the partnership; and in 2005 the MOON Project initiative became international with the addition of Australian Catholic University and University of Southern Queensland in Australia and Shiga University in Japan, along with Oklahoma State University in the United States.
  

• The MOON Project was honored with the Ohaus Award for Innovations in Science Teaching in 2003 by the National Science Teachers Association.

• There is no charge to students, teachers or students for their involvement in the MOON Project.

• More information can be found in "Meeting the MOON from a Global Perspective" in the May 2003 issue of Science Scope (vol. 28, #6, pages 24-28).  NSTA members can access the article from nsta.org

• For more information or for teachers to involve their students in the MOON Project, contact the MOON Project Director, Dr. Walter S. Smith, at: wsmith@bsu.edu

The MOON Project has been funded by grants from the Ball State University Diversity Associates Project and NASA.
Last modified 10 May 2005.