An explorer finds new things and new places.
There are a lot of places to explore!
Look at these pictures.
Do you know who the first space explorers were?
They were not astronauts.
They were not humans!
The first space explorers were animals.
Before any humans went to space, we sent animals to space to see if it was safe.
We sent monkeys, dogs, frogs, rabbits, mice and even flies!
Sadly, many of the animals died in space.
But some animals lived!
Able and Miss Baker were two monkeys who explored space.
Miss Baker lived for almost thirty years after she came back to Earth alive.
Many human astronauts have explored space too.
In July 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first humans to walk on the moon.
They left their footprints on the moon!
Today, there are many astronauts in space.
But there are also other explorers.
This is the Mars Rover.
It is a robot explorer!
This robot explores Mars and tells about what it finds.
There are all kinds of space explorers!
Exercise
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