M. Blake, James M. McKee, R. Statom, Chiong Qiu, F. Menapace
{"title":"Evaluating Strategies To Collect Micrometeorites From Rainwater For Citizen Scientists","authors":"M. Blake, James M. McKee, R. Statom, Chiong Qiu, F. Menapace","doi":"10.19030/JAESE.V5I2.10223","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.19030/JAESE.V5I2.10223","url":null,"abstract":"Micrometeorites originate from small pieces of rock from space colliding with the Earth’s atmosphere at high velocity, such as the Perseid meteors which hit the atmosphere at 60 km/s. When they do so, they burn up, causing a flash of light that we see as a meteor. Many groups have been successful collecting these particles using various devices. Such activities make great science projects for middle and high school students, and we plan to start a program to train students in the collecting methods and get them interested in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) careers. Various methods are used to collect micrometeorites from rainwater, but little work has been done to assess the most efficient method of collecting these particles from space and then analyzing them. Before we began our citizen science project, we determined that it was necessary to conduct a pilot project to determine the most effective method of collecting micrometeorites from rainwater. Four collecting methods were tried and the method that collected the most micrometeorites was also the simplest, that being a simple bucket under the downspout of the gutter system of a house and a magnet which is then run through the bucket to gather the meteorites.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-12-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44853899","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Video Killed the Writing Assignment","authors":"N. Zellner","doi":"10.1119/1.5080591","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1119/1.5080591","url":null,"abstract":"An introductory Astronomy survey course is often taken to satisfy a college graduation requirement for non-science majors at colleges around the United States. In this course, material that can be broadly categorized into topics related to “the sky”, “the Solar System”, “the Galaxy”, and “cosmology” is discussed. Even with the wide variety of topics in these categories, though, students may not be 100% interested in the course content, and it is almost certain that a specific topic about which a student wishes to learn is not covered. To at least partly address these issues, to appeal to all of the students in this class, and to allow students to explore topics of their choice, a video project has been assigned to students at Albion College as a class activity. In this assignment, students are asked to create a video of a famous (or not) astronomer, astronomical object or discovery, or telescope observatory to present to the class. Students work in pairs to create a video that is original and imaginative and includes accurate scientific content. For this project, then, students use a familiar technology and exercise their creativity while learning a little (or a lot of) science along the way. Herein data on types and topics of videos, examples of videos, assignment requirements and grading rubrics, lessons learned, and student comments will be discussed and shared.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-11-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1119/1.5080591","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44447352","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Improving Your Argument By Identifying A Literature Gap","authors":"T. Slater","doi":"10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10194","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10194","url":null,"abstract":"More often than not, a peer-reviewed journal article’s literature review is a boring to read as it is to write. However, literature reviews do not need to be laborious for all involved. Instead, the best literature reviews offer a crisp view of a researcher’s landscape and succinctly provides a compelling case for critical research that needs to be done in order to move the field forward. In order to provide readers with a useful literature review, it is critical that authors avoid providing paragraph after paragraph describing a summative chronology of the topic in the literature, but instead provide a critical synthesis of what is known, and what is not known about a topic. In the end, if the reader is convinced of what will be known and advanced as a result of a researcher undertaking the considerable time and effort to conduct and publish a given study, the reader is much more likely to cite your paper downstream in their own work.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-07-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"68235021","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Melina Silva de Lima, E. Amôres, José Vicente Cardoso Santos, V. Martin
{"title":"What's That Object? Learning Astronomical Concepts Through The Use Of The Aladin Program And Manipulation Of Astronomical Images","authors":"Melina Silva de Lima, E. Amôres, José Vicente Cardoso Santos, V. Martin","doi":"10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10191","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10191","url":null,"abstract":"Various studies have noted current shortcomings in the teaching and learning of science in schools, and the results of large-scale tests show that despite heavy investment in education, Brazilians' understanding of science test scores typically fall short of what could be if students had a consistent, high-quality basic education. This article summarizes the teaching plan and systematic study results for an activity titled \"What’s That Object?\" implemented in the city of Salvador, Bahia state, Brazil, in 2015. Astronomical concepts were taught, and the Aladin software was used in the lessons, which included two computerized memory games produced for this activity.We believe that the results lend strong support to the notion that astronomy education can be improved and motivates educators to teach astronomical concepts at the elementary school level.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-07-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45886144","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Mental Models Of Groundwater Residence: A Deeper Understanding Of Students’ Preconceptions As A Resource For Teaching And Learning About Groundwater And Aquifers","authors":"L. Arthurs, Justin M. Elwonger","doi":"10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10192","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10192","url":null,"abstract":"There is a growing need for public understanding about groundwater resources. Knowing what groundwater and aquifers are is fundamental to understanding more complex issues such as groundwater quality and availability. However, groundwater and related concepts are among the topics that instructors most struggle to teach. Although constructivist theories suggest that students’ preconceptions or misconceptions can be used as teaching tools, the question about exactly how remains. A resource perspective on this question states the first step involves understanding students’ preconceptions. To gain a deeper understanding of college students’ pre-instructional mental models about groundwater residence, 215 students enrolled in introductory-level environmental geoscience courses taught at two large US state universities were surveyed. An open-ended questionnaire asked participants to draw and label a concept sketch. Follow-up interviews asked participants to elaborate upon their concept sketches. Eight categories of mental models emerged from the analysis of the collected data. These results were interpreted through the lens of cognitive schema theory, which generated to four patterns of mental models. These patterns emphasize key aspects of students’ pre-instructional mental models about groundwater residence. Instructors can use this information to design instructional activities about groundwater and aquifers using a resource perspective.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-07-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45910647","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Changes In Calendars In The Ancient World As A Tool To Teach The Development Of Astronomy","authors":"A. Cohen","doi":"10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10193","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10193","url":null,"abstract":"When teaching an introductory science survey course to college students learning astronomy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, we have devoted four hours to teaching the history of astronomy as a fruitful strategy to introduce important concepts surrounding the development of general scientific knowledge throughout history. In order to illustrate the impact of improved accuracy of astronomical measurements, we propose using the example the development of the calendars and, in particular, the widespread Hebrew calendars used throughout the adjacent Millennia of B.C. and A.C. The changes in the several determinations of the Hebrew calendar are demonstrated based on Babylonian and Jewish documents as well as works by al-Khwarizmi from the 9th century AD, found in the Khuda Bakhsh Oriental Library, in Patna India. Our experience suggests that the teaching of calendar development and evolutions demonstrates the interconnectedness between scientific endeavors and social-religious traditions.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-07-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41623666","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Sophie Bartlett, M. Fitzgerald, D. Mckinnon, L. Danaia, J. Lazendic-Galloway
{"title":"Astronomy And Science Student Attitudes (ASSA): A Short Review And Validation Of A New Instrument","authors":"Sophie Bartlett, M. Fitzgerald, D. Mckinnon, L. Danaia, J. Lazendic-Galloway","doi":"10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10190","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.19030/JAESE.V5I1.10190","url":null,"abstract":"A new survey for measuring students’ astronomy and science attitudes that has been validated for use with high school students (with a future intent to expand to middle school and university) is presented. We initially present a short review of instruments in the literature that attempt to measure attitudes in astronomy together with the difficulties encountered in measuring these by researchers in the subsequent analyses of results. To illustrate this, we present an example from an Astro101-level university course to display the problems with the current, most commonly used, astronomy attitude instrument. We then present the initial design and the Factor Analysis of a new instrument designed to address the deficiencies of this existing instrument from a sample of students in a high school-level astronomy education project. The factors identified by this instrument include: Interest in Astronomy, Interest in Science Outside of School, Practical Work in Science, Teacher’s Actions in science, Perceptions of Ability in Science, Future Aspirations in Science, Benefits of Science, and Personal Relevance of School Science, all of which possess high internal response consistency and construct validity.","PeriodicalId":52014,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Astronomy and Earth Sciences Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2018-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43381895","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}