| The second annual UNL Astronomy Education Workshop took place on
Friday, September 21. The workshop was organized by Dr. Kevin Lee
and Dr. Ed Schmidt of the UNL Department of Physics and Astronomy.
The goal of the workshop was to bring together college and high school
astronomy instructors from across Nebraska to discuss how to effectively
incorporate instructional technology into their teaching.
A major focus at this workshop was the usage of robotic telescopes.
The keynote speaker was Dr. Robert Mutel from the University of
Iowa. In the past, his research interest was mainly in using radio
astronomy (especially using very long baseline interferometry) to
study active galaxies, active stars, and interstellar turbulence.
However, for the last several years, Dr. Mutel has turned his attention
toward developing robotic telescopes. These telescopes are used
in faculty research, undergraduate research, and undergraduate laboratories.
Over 700 students each year make use of the Iowa Robotic Telescope
Facility, primarily in introductory laboratories. In the past two
years, six research papers have been written by undergraduates using
this facility. Dr. Mutel is currently working on the development
of a mass-producible robotic telescope system to be marketed to
high schools and small colleges. See the project Rigel site at http://denali.physics.uiowa.edu/rigel/
for more details.
Attendees were also exposed to Kinesthetic Astronomy. This activity
involves using simple body movements to learn about the relationships
between time and astronomical motion of the Earth and what we see
in the sky at various times of the day and year. It was developed
for grades 5 through 8, but can easily be modified for older and
younger students. Kinesthetic Astronomy was developed by Cherilynn
Morrow and Mike Zawaski at the Space Science Institute and can be
downloaded from their website at http://www.spacescience.org.
The workshop concluded with a visit to the computer lab to work
with NAAP (Nebraska Astronomy Applet Project) computer simulations.
Each educator was able to log into a computer account and experiment
with the applets. Short presentations were made by local educators
Kent Reinhard (SECC and NWU), Mark Clark (Doane), Todd Young (WSC),
and Dave Kriegler (UNO) on an applet that they have used. |
