The technology behind the rockets that carried astronauts to the Moon is an important component of our story, and this lesson is design to give you an overview of how a rocket works and what the Saturn V rocket did for the space program. The information about the rocket itself is not part of the final exam, although the discussion of some of the technical challenges that engineers had to solve in order to be able to accomplish the mission of landing a man on the Moon may inform some of the questions we cover in this unit (and according can support your answers on the final exam questions if you choose these as your examples of challenges).
Essentially, a rocket has a combustion chamber and nozzle that directs the thrust of the engine downward to propel the rocket. Rockets typically are fueled by liquid or solid fuel that is composed of an oxidizer (often Oxygen) and a fuel mixture (in the case of the NASA rockets we are studying, Hydrogen). The fuel is usually held in a stage, or section of the rocket. When combined, they create the energy and thrust that lifts the rocket into the air. You can watch a five minute video explaining how rockets work here. The rockets we are talking about have several stages, meaning there are multiple self-contained segments of the rocket. The first stage is at the very bottom and is ignited first; once it has burned through its fuel, it is discarded (falling away from the rest of the rocket) and the second stage fuel is ignited. This process continues until the rocket reaches the altitude required for orbit.
NASA's Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions went through a number of rocket designs ranging from the Redstone and Atlas rockets to the Saturn I and Titan II rockets. Eventually the main workhorse of the Apollo missions became the three-stage Saturn V rocket. This short video from Space Center Houston describes the Saturn V rocket and walks you around the rocket on display at Johnson Space Center in Houston.