Intrepid Teacher's Corner

Intrepid Teacher's Corner

Dear Educators:


The words honor, educate, and inspire are the very core of the mission of the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum. To accomplish this mission and assist you in academically challenging your students in a fun and interesting way, Intrepid’s Education Department has created several lesson plans that you can use in your classroom to teach students a number of subject disciplines including earth science, archeology, density and buoyancy, American history, English language arts, visual arts, technology, and community service.

We thank you for taking the time to look through this webpage and hope that our lessons will be helpful to you in the classroom. We certainly have enjoyed putting them together for you!

Sincerely,

The Education Department
Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum

Social Studies / Language Arts

Introduction
Men who served aboard the Intrepid were assigned to various roles that helped make the ship run efficiently and effectively. This activity will help students envision what men’s lives were like aboard the Intrepid and will help them fine tune their creative writing skills.

Social Studies / Art

Introduction
Monuments and memorials are designed by artists and laypeople alike to inspire action, remember important people and events, and bring closure to painful episodes. In addition, personal and cultural perceptions of monuments and memorials change with time. The following activities will help introduce students to the concepts of monuments and memorials and give them the opportunity to learn more about the Intrepid as such.

Science / Earth Science

Introduction
The USS Intrepid is an Essex Class Aircraft Carrier that was docked in New York City’s Hudson River (it is now in Bayonne to be dry docked for repairs). From its early service in the Pacific Ocean during World War II to recovering space capsules for NASA in the Caribbean Sea, the Intrepid has served in many of our neighboring waters.

Social Studies

Introduction
This lesson will show students how an underwater archeological dig is conducted and then have students deduce information about shipwrecks. In our “wreck”, we imagined that students are excavating an early 20th century merchant vessel that sunk due to bad weather, but you may adapt the ship and the circumstances to better fit in with your curriculum.

History / Technology

Introduction
This lesson allows students to analyze what the most significant inventions of the 20th Century are and how these inventions will impact the 21st century. Students will also consider how their lives would be affected by the absence of these items, which items have most helped society, and which have most harmed society.

Chemistry / Earth Science

Introduction
This lesson offers several demonstrations that reveal that freshwater is less dense that salt water.

Community Service / Business Planning

Introduction
New York City builder and philanthropist Zachary Fisher knew that there was more American history to be learned than what was found in textbooks and he recognized that Intrepid epitomizes that untold history.