AWAY WE GO: ALL ABOUT
TRANSPORTATION
1 videocassette . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 minutes
Copyright MCMLXXXX
Rainbow Educational Media
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Raleigh, NC 27616-3177
Distributed by:
United Learning
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Evanston, IL 60201
800-323-9084
www.unitedlearning.com |
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction ........................................................................
1
Program Summary..............................................................
1
Learning Objectives............................................................
3
Review Questions...............................................................
4
Activities.............................................................................
6
Bibliography.......................................................................
7
Script...................................................................................
8
INTRODUCTION
Most children are naturally interested in planes, cars, boats and
other forms of transportation. The video program Away We Go:
All About Transportation builds on this fascination with transportation to help children understand why it is important to their lives
and how modern forms of transportation came about.
The video covers all the major modes of transportation: over
land, water, and in air and space. It describes the important
functions of transportation in terms of trade, communications,
recreation, travel, and exploration.
The program sharpens students' perception of how transportation
affects them personally by picturing young children observing and
using different kinds of transportation.
A wide range of examples of different types of transportation is
illustrated. Transportation is compared with that of many years
ago and we are shown how its improvements have enriched our
lives.
PROGRAM SUMMARY
The video opens with a variety of images of different types of
transportation: a girl visiting a friend in a car, a boy pulling a wagon
across a playground, a jet crossing the sky, trains speeding
through the countryside, a ferry in a harbor, and the space shuttle.
The narration establishes that transportation means moving people
or things from one place to another.
After the title, the video explains that even when we are not
going anywhere, we depend on transportation. The video shows a
girl looking at an apple. It asks where the apple came from and
how it might get to us. It then explains how transportation helps
get food from where it is grown to stores where we can buy it.
The program proceeds to show other uses of transportation. It
illustrates how transportation helps people get to work. Images of a
navigator on a ship, a forklift operator, and a railroad engineer
show how people's jobs often depend on transportation. The
program discusses how transportation brings people together
and helps them keep in touch. Images of a girl riding a bike and of
people canoeing, show another function of transportation—it is a
source of fun and recreation.
Then the viewer is asked to think about something that is very
important to many modes of transportation: the wheel. Cartoon-
like graphics show what life was like before the wheel. People either
walked or rode on animals. The program discusses how the
invention of the wheel dramatically improved transportation by
making possible the development of wagons and carts.
The program next goes on to show how another invention, the
steam engine, had an effect on transportation almost as important
as the wheel. The steam engine made the development of trains
and railroads possible. Archival photographs of early trains and
steam engines, as well as modern footage of old trains, show the
early impact of trains on transportation. Contemporary images
of freight and passenger trains show how railroads continue to be
important today.
But trains eventually became less important than another form of
transportation over land: the car. The video describes how early cars
were called horseless carriages because they looked like the
carriages drawn by horses in those days. Old film footage of a
family taking a drive humorously illustrates how riding in a car was
considered something special. It also illustrates how primitive
roads were in those days.
These early images of the automobile are then contrasted to
contemporary images of automobiles on modern highways. The
narrator points to other forms of motor vehicles, such as trucks
and buses.
Two girls standing on a city street then point to the variety of
motor vehicles we have today. They identify a motorcycle, garbage
truck, mail truck, and van.
The video then shifts to transportation of a different sort,
transportation over water. The program describes how in the past
boats were powered either by the strength of human arms (as with
the canoe) or, in the case of sailing boats, pushed by the wind. Old
prints illustrate how sailing boats enabled countries separated by
oceans or seas to trade with each other.
But a different kind of boat became more important than sailing
ships, the steamboat. The steam engine, the same invention that
made railroads possible, also radically changed the nature of
transportation on water. The video shows how steamboats made
travel and commerce up and down rivers and across oceans
easier and faster.
Then the video shows a variety of different modern boats as
children's voices identify what they are and what they do.
Next, the video explores another mode of transportation, transportation through the air. A series of comical illustrations of bizarre
"flying machines" shows different ways people thought they might
be able to fly. But a child's balloon provides a more accurate clue to
how humans first flew. The program describes how humans first
ascended into the air in hot-air balloons.
Old film footage of early flights by the Wright Brothers and
Lindberg's flight across the Atlantic illustrates the development of
the airplane.
The program next shows images of modern aircraft and
describes their many functions. Among the most important is to
help bring together people who live far apart.
Finally, the video looks at another form of transportation, one
that allows people to leave the earth altogether. It shows how
rockets and spacecraft have enabled people to walk on the moon
and explore outer space.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After viewing this program, children should:
1. understand how transportation affects their daily lives, and the
impact of transportation in such areas as:
— trade
— work
— communications
— recreation
— exploration
2.
know more about specific modes of transportation,
particularly:
— automobiles
— trains and railroads
— aircraft
— ships and boats
— rockets and spacecraft
3. know more about the development of different forms of
transportation developed and be able to compare transportation
in the past to the present.
4. understand how the development of more advanced forms of
transportation has brought people closer together and made
trade and travel easier.
REVIEW QUESTIONS
1.
What is transportation?
[Transportation is the means by which people or things
get from one place to another.]
2.
Describe different ways people might get to their jobs.
[Answers will vary. Examples in the program include cars,
buses, and trains.]
3.
Describe people's jobs that involve transportation.
[Answers will vary. Examples in the program include fork
lift driving, oil tank steering, and train engineering.]
4.
How does transportation help people stay in touch and
come together?
[Answers will vary. Examples in the program include
airplanes' making it easier for children and grandparents to
visit each other, and cars' enabling children to visit
friends.]
5.
What was an early invention that makes many kinds of
transportation possible today?
[The wheel]
6. How did the wheel first make transportation easier?
[The wheel made it possible for wagons and carts to carry
larger loads more easily than people or animals could
carry by themselves.]
7.
What invention made trains and railroads possible?
[The steam engine.]
8. Name different kinds of trains and what they do.
[Answers may vary. Examples in the program include
freight trains that carry freight and passenger trains that
carry people.]
9. What form of transportation over land became more important
than trains?
[The car.]
10. Name other kinds of motor vehicles besides cars.
[Answers will vary. Examples in the program include
trucks, buses, motorcycles, garbage trucks, and vans.]
11. How did early boats move through the water?
[Answers may vary. The program cites the power of
human arms to paddle a canoe, and the wind to push sail
boats.]
12. What are paddle wheelers.
[Early steam boats that were pushed through the water by
paddle wheels driven by steam engines.]
13. Name some different kinds of boats and ships that are
used today.
[Examples in the program include canoes, rowboats, sail
boats, oil tankers, passenger ships, fishing boats, tugboats, ferry boats.]
14. How did humans first fly?
[In balloons.]
15. Who invented the airplane?
[The Wright Brothers.]
16. Who first flew across the Atlantic Ocean?
[Charles Lindberg.]
17. How was it possible for humans to travel to the moon?
[By use of rockets.]
18. How do astronauts reach outer space, today?
[By space shuttle.]
SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES AND
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
The following questions and activities are designed to build on
themes suggested in the video. Those activities involving research
and writing may be more appropriate for older children.
1. The video suggests different ways transportation affects our
lives. For example, the food we eat reaches us with the help of
transportation. Transportation lets us visit friends or relatives.
Ask the children to discuss different ways transportation
affects their daily lives.
Older children might keep a simple diary for several days
and list different events that depended on transportation.
2.
Ask the children to name examples of a type of transportation; for example, ask them to name different kinds of ships
and boats. Ask them what each example does and where it
might be found.
3.
Ask children to talk about how their lives might be different if a
specific kind of transportation didn't exist. For example,
how would their lives be different if there were no cars? Mo
airplanes?
4.
Art Projects: Children could do projects in which they create
their own books about transportation. For example, they
might cut pictures of different cars or boats out of magazines
or draw their own pictures.
5.
Depending on where they live, children could visit a local
airport, bus station, or harbor facility to see how such hubs of
transportation function.
6.
Children could talk to older relatives, particularly grandparents, to learn how transportation and travel were different
when these relatives were young.
7.
The video mentions the poor condition of roads in the early
days of the automobile. Not all roads in the past, however,
were bad. The Romans, in particular, built excellent roads.
Older students could research how Roman roads were
built and what effect they had on travel and trade in the days
of the Roman Empire.
8.
The video touches upon the history of various forms of
transportation. Older children could pick one form of transportation and do research, in greater depth, into its early
history and how it developed.
9.
The video mentions that, before trains, it took months to
cross the country by covered wagon. Older children could
research and report on the Oregon Trail.
10. Older children could research and report on the history of
travel by humans to the moon, or other examples of travel by
humans into space.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Ardley, Neil, Transportation on Earth. New York; Franklin Watts,
1981.
Benson, D. S., Man and the Wheel. London; Priory Press Limited,
1973.
Boyne, Walter J., The Smithsonian Book of Flight. Washington,
D.C; Smithsonian Books, 1987.
Geogornano, G. N., Transportation Through the Ages. New York;
McGraw-Hill, 1972.
Goldblatt, Susan., Road Transport. Hove, East Sussex; Wayland
Publishers Limited, 1976.
Halacy, D. S., On the Move: Man and Transportation. Philadelphia;
Macrae Smith Company, 1974.
Jensen, Oliver, The American Heritage History of Railroads in
America. New York; American Heritage Publishing Co., 1975.
Kalman, Bobbie, Early Travel. New York; Crabtree Publishing
Company, 1981.
Roberts, David, The Great Book of Railways. Windmere, Florida;
Reay Rourke Publishing Company, 1981.
Simmons, Mortimer, The Story of Trains. New York; G. P.
Putnam's Sons, 1963.
Throm, Edward L. (editor). Popular Mechanic's Picture History of
American Transportation. New York; Simon and Schuster,
1952.
Tunis, Edward, Oars, Sails and Steam. New York; Thomas A.
Crowell Company, 1952.
7
CREDITS
Author and Producer: Peter Cochran
Video Photography: Peter Scheer
Graphics and Animation: Roger Meyer
Stock Video: Air France
American Airlines
Amtrak
Caterpillar Tractor
Encyclopaedia Britannica Educational Corp.
Ford Museum
Holland American Line
Killington, Ltd.
National Park Service
NASA
New York Public Library
Santa Fe Railroad
Smithsonian Air and Space Museum
Onion Pacific Railroad Stock
Research: Henrietta Toth Narrator: Richard
Cassell Post Production: Deerfield Video Audio
Sweetening: Acme Recording Studios
Produced for
RAINBOW EDUCATIONAL VIDEO
by COCHRAN
COMMUNICATIONS
SCRIPT
NARRATOR:
How do you get from one place to another?
How do people or things get to you?
When we talk about how things and people get from one place to
another, we're talking about transportation.
There are different kinds of transportation. There's transportation
by land...
By water...
And by air...
There's transportation for short distances...
And for very long distances.
There are many, many kinds of transportation.
8
TITLE Away We Go: All
About Transportation
NARRATOR:
Even when we are not going anywhere, transportation is important
to us for many reasons.
Next time you bite into some kind of food, think about this:
Where did it come from? And how did it get to you?
Much of the food we eat is grown on farms and orchards that
may be many miles from where we live.
So, how does this food get from the orchards and farms to us?
CHILD:
By transportation?
NARRATOR:
Right! By transportation...maybe by trucks. Trucks are often
used to transport food and other things.
They take them to stores where we can buy them and take
them home.
Here's another question for you. How do you think your mother or
father get to work?
CHILD:
By transportation.
NARRATOR:
Right again. Perhaps by car,
or bus,
or train.
Even on the job people often depend on transportation —
whether it be a person who drives a large fork lift that carries heavy
loads,
or someone who helps steer a supertanker, a very large ship that
carries oil,
or the engineer on a freight train.
Transportation helps us get to where we want to go, whether it is
just into town to buy groceries,
or all the way across the country.
Transportation brings people closer together. Because of airplanes children can more easily visit grandparents, even if they live
thousands of miles away.
Transportation also can be fun, whether we bicycle on a country
path,
or paddle a canoe down a river, or just ride a skateboard across a
driveway. Can you think of some other ways we use
transportation?
CHILDREN:
"School buses take us to school!"
"Ambulances take people to the hospital!"
"We drive our car places on vacation!"
NARRATOR:
Now let's take a look at something that is important to many
kinds of transportation...from cars on a highway... to a plane
landing on a runway...
or even just a wagon being pulled across a playground.
That something is the wheel.
The wheel makes many kinds of transportation possible.
In fact it's hard to imagine what our lives would be like without
the wheel. Can you think of how people got around before the
wheel was invented.?
Well, people had to walk...
or ride animals.
Nobody is sure when or where the wheel was invented. It may
have been invented by different people in different parts of the
world.
But no matter where or how it was invented, the wheel made it
possible to build wagons and carts. Wagons and carts could carry
bigger loads with less effort than people or animals could carry by
themselves.
For much of human history, when people wanted to travel over
land, they used wagons pulled by oxen or horses or other animals.
But travelling long distances this way could be slow and hard.
But then there was another invention, one almost as important as
the wheel in terms of how it improved transportation.
This invention was the steam engine, an engine that works with
steam rather than the gasoline that many engines use today.
The steam engine made it possible to build trains that could
move things without the help of animals.
Some of the first trains were funny looking, and they didn't go
very fast.
And passengers on these early trains did not enjoy a great deal
of comfort. The ride could be very bumpy!
10
But trains soon improved. They became faster and more
comfortable,
and new railroads were built as tracks were laid all across the
country.
Along these railroads new towns and cities were also built as
people took advantage of this improved form of transportation.
Farmers used railroads to ship crops
and ranchers to ship cattle.
And even though trains from back then might look uncomfortable
to us today, they made travelling from one place to another much
easier.
Because of trains, it became possible to go from New York to
California, clear across the United States, in only seven days.
Before trains the same journey by wagon had taken months.
Today, trains continue to serve our transportation needs.
There are huge freight trains, sometimes over a mile long, that
carry many different kinds of things.
Among the many things freight trains carry are food, coal,
machinery...
even cars and trucks.
There are also other kinds of trains, trains that carry people,
called passenger trains.
Passenger trains crisscross our country taking people to many
different places.
In addition, there are trains, called subways, that travel underground and take people from one place to another within a city.
But trains today aren't as important as they once were. We
depend more on another form of transportation.
This kind of transportation lets us visit a friend in the next town.
CHILD:
"Cars!"
NARRATOR:
Cars have been around for over a hundred years. The first cars
didn't look much different from the carriages that were drawn by
horses. In fact, these cars were called "horseless carriages."
Imagine what it would have been like to grow up 70 or 75 years
ago. Not many people had cars back then.
And even for those who did, getting into the family car and
taking a ride was very exciting.
Taking the car for a spin on a Sunday afternoon was something
the whole family looked forward to.
11
Roads were a little different back then. For one thing, very few
roads were paved.
The ride was much bumpier.
And roads often were so narrow that meeting a car coming in
the opposite direction often meant coming to an abrupt halt.
And when it rained and the dirt turned to mud, roads became
even worse.
Things have changed a lot since the early days of the automobile. For one thing, roads and highways are much better.
We also depend on cars today much more than people used to.
In fact, it's hard to imagine what our lives would be like without
cars.
CHILDREN:
"I'd have to walk to school."
"1 wonder how I would visit my friends."
"I wonder how we'd get places on vacation."
NARRATOR:
Cars make it easier to go where we please, when we please.
Besides cars, we depend on many other kinds of motor vehicles, like trucks.
Trucks can carry big loads that might not fit in a car.
And unlike trains, trucks don't need tracks to go on. Trucks can
drive on roads and go many places where trains can't.
Besides cars and trucks, there are also buses that carry lots
of people.
Look on any highway or street and see how many different kinds of
motor vehicles there are.
CHILDREN:
"Motorcycles!"
"Garbage trucks!"
"Mail trucks!"
"Vans!"
But while cars and trucks and buses can make transportation
easier, as more and more people drive, our roads and highways
often become jammed.
Maybe sometimes it's nicer just to walk!
So far we've looked at transportation on roads and on railways.
But there's another way that people use transportation...on
waterways.
12
Along our rivers, there are barges that carry things like coal
and grain.
On oceans, freighters carry wheat, machinery...all kinds of
different things,
and ocean liners and cruise ships carry passengers.
But long before there were ships and boats like these there were
other kinds of boats.
Some, like the canoes of the American Indians, depended on
the strength of human arms to go anywhere.
Others depended on sails so that boats could be pushed by
the wind.
Sailing ships were once the main way different countries around
the world did business with each other.
Over a hundred years ago, beautiful sailing ships called clipper
ships sailed from San Francisco to China, carrying cargos of
machinery and other things,
and they returned from China with cargoes of tea and spices.
A few old sailing ships are still around. They are kept so people
can see for themselves what these beautiful old boats used to
look like.
Besides sailing ships, you can still see another kind of old boat,
one that became more important than sailing ships — the
steamboat.
Like trains, the steamboat was made possible by the invention
of the steam engine.
Steam engines moved large wheels that acted as paddles. In
fact, early steamboats were called "paddle wheelers."
Steamboats became more important than sailing ships
because they didn't depend on the wind to move them.
Over 100 years ago, steamboats like this one moved up and
down our rivers, especially the great Mississippi. These steamboats carried both freight and passengers.
Later, steamships also sailed across oceans, making travel
between different countries easier and faster.
Steamships continued to get bigger and better...Giant
oceanliners were built that could carry passengers across the
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
Today, ocean liners and other boats look different.
But boats and ships are still used for many of the same things.
Can you think of some things that boats do today?
13
CHILDREN:
"Ferry boats carry people."
"Tugboats push barges."
"Fishing boats catch fish."
NARRATOR:
Besides boats that have motors or engines, there are still sailing
boats.
And you can still paddle a canoe down a river
or row a boat across a lake.
We've seen how trains and cars make it possible to travel over
land,
and boats and ships over water.
But there is still another way.
CHILD:
"Through the air!"
NARRATOR:
Today, an airplane flying overhead is a common sight.
But years ago, people could only look at birds winging their way
through the air and dream of what it might be like to fly like a bird.
Some people actually tried to fly like birds. They put on wings
and jumped from high places. Do you think that worked?
CHILD:
"No!"
NARRATOR:
Others dreamed of crazy flying machines that were never built.
Do you think this flying machine worked?
CHILD:
"No Way!"
NARRATOR:
Can you guess how people first flew?
Well a toy balloon provides a hint.
About 200 years ago, people began to build balloons that, when
filled with hot air, would lift off the ground.
There are people today who still fly hot-air balloons...such
balloons are a lot of fun, but once they're in the air you can't control
where the wind blows them.
14
It was less than one hundred years ago that the first airplane was
designed and built by Orville Wright
and his brother Wilbur.
Their plane had a propeller in back. Powered by a small gasoline
engine, the propeller was designed to push the plane through the
air while the pilot, lying on the wing, steered it.
To everyone's amazement, the Wright brothers' plane actually
flew. Its first voyage was short — it lasted only 12 seconds, for a
distance of less than half the length of a football field.
But soon the Wright brothers were flying farther and longer. The
fuzzy pictures you see now were from movies made at that time.
Movies had just been invented and weren't nearly as good as they
are today.
Planes got better and could fly higher and farther. A daring pilot
named Charles Lindbergh wondered if it would be possible to fly
all the way across the Atlantic Ocean.
One misty day in 1927, Lindbergh took off from New York. The
next day he landed in Paris, France. Lindbergh helped prove that
planes could fly people long distances.
Today, people think nothing of travelling around the world in
airplanes. But instead of the small, slow planes of Lindbergh's day,
there are large, fast jets.
Besides jets there are other kinds of aircraft...like helicopters,
and there are still small propeller planes.
Aircraft have many uses. Because of airplanes, food from all
over the world can be flown to America and still be fresh and
delicious.
Planes also carry mail, clothes, machinery and lots of other
things.
But perhaps most important, airplanes bring people in the
world closer together. It now takes only a few hours for someone
living in Japan to visit friends in California.
But even with airplanes, there were some people who wanted to
fly even higher and farther.
Some people looked at the moon and wondered if it would be
possible to fly there. It seemed like just a dream.
But large rockets were designed and built that could fly people to
the moon.
Can you imagine what it must be like to be on a rocket going to
the moon;
to leave the earth far behind?
15
And then to land on the moon and to walk where nobody has
ever walked before?
Today, the space shuttle continues to make it possible for
astronauts to travel into space.
Rockets like the space shuttle point to another use of transportation. Transportation gives us opportunities to explore new
places and new frontiers.
In the future, space ships may provide a way for men and
women to be able to travel much farther from earth, perhaps even to
explore other planets.
But in the meantime, transportation on earth continues to serve
us in many ways.
Cars and trucks roll across our roads and highways
and make it easier to visit friends.
Trains speed along their tracks, carrying people and freight past
sleepy towns and into big cities...
Boats make their way across harbors and rivers and lakes.
And planes crisscross the skies, bringing cities and nations of
the world closer together.
Today, even the stars seem less distant, as space vehicles
transport people far above the earth.
When we look at the past, we can see how, as transportation
improved, people's lives have changed in dramatic ways.
Looking toward the future, who knows where transportation
may take us?
16
CLOZE EVALUATION PROCEDURE
AWAY WE GO: ALL ABOUT TRANSPORTATION
NAME
DIRECTIONS: Select the answer from the four choices given, by circling the correct letter.
1. There are many different ways to move people and things from one place to another.
Trains, cars, and boats are all types of ____ .. Other ways to carry people and goods are by
airplanes, trucks, and buses.
2. Before we had these kinds of transportation, we used carts and wagons. In order for them to
move, the _____ had to be discovered. Then people could travel faster and farther.
3. Animals that pulled the wagons and carts could not go very fast. When a motor called the ——
——— was made, people could travel a long way. Trains and boats first used this kind of motor.
4. This type of transportation was the first to carry people across the country. These rode on
tracks, and steam engines made them move. Today they carry food,
people, and even cars, across the United States.
5. Special kinds of trains transport people in our big cities. They are called _____ and they
move under the ground. They use electricity to make them move and can carry many
passengers quickly.
6. There is one type of transportation that we use most. The __
any other kind of transportation. We use it to go to school, work, and on
vacation.
is used more than
7. Special kinds of vans or trucks carry people to the hospital when they are hurt. The
moves quickly through the city and the doctors are waiting at the hospital to help.
8. Boats are still used to move people and food across the lakes and oceans. One type of boat
called the _____ carries food, cars, and things we buy, across the oceans. They help countries
trade with one another.
9. When people want to travel a long way or get somewhere quickly, they use a special kind
of transportation. The _____ flies very high in the air and very fast. Many people enjoy
traveling this way.
10. Only in the last few years were people able to travel into outer space. A large _____ with big
motors carries scientists up into space. It was even used to land men on the moon. Transportation
carries people, food, and things, quickly and safely from one place to another.
This form may be reproduced without receiving permission from Rainbow Educational Video
1. (A) movers
(B) transportation
(C) carriers
(D) shippers
2. (A) wheel
(B) road
(C) animal
(D) track
3. (A) sail
(B) rocket
(C) steam engine
(D) balloon
4. (A) trucks
(B) cars
(C) ships
(D) trains
5. (A) buses
(B) subways
(C) vans
(D) trucks
6. (A) airplane
(B) truck
(C) car
(D) boat
7. (A) ambulance
(B) bus
(C) subway
(D) cab
8. (A) canoe
(B) ocean liner
(C) tug boat
(D) freighter
9. (A) airplane
(B) balloon
(C) car
(D) truck
10. (A) jet
(B) rocket
(C) airplane
(D) balloon