Astronomy

WorldWide Telescope in Education

The American Astronomical Society’s WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a visualization program that enables a computer to function as a virtual telescope—bringing together archival imagery from the world’s best ground- and space-based telescopes for the exploration of the universe. It is a powerful resource for astronomy education. In this chapter, we describe curricula developed by the authors that use WWT in teaching key topics in Astro 101 and K–12 science, including parallax, Hubble’s Law and large-scale structure in the universe, seasons, Moon phases and eclipses, and life in the universe.

Author/Presenter

Patricia Udomprasert

Alyssa Goodman

Edwin Ladd

Stella Offner

Harry Houghton

Erin Johnson

Susan Sunbury

Julia Plummer

Erika Wright

Philip Sadler

Philip Rosenfield

Curtis Wong

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2019
Short Description

This chapter describes curricula that use WorldWide Telescope in teaching key topics in Astro 101 and K–12 science, including parallax, Hubble’s Law and large-scale structure in the universe, seasons, Moon phases and eclipses, and life in the universe.

PhET Interactive Simulations

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

Author/Presenter

The PhET Sims Team

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2020
Short Description

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

PhET Interactive Simulations

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

Author/Presenter

The PhET Sims Team

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2020
Short Description

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

PhET Interactive Simulations

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

Author/Presenter

The PhET Sims Team

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2020
Short Description

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

PhET Interactive Simulations

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

Author/Presenter

The PhET Sims Team

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2020
Short Description

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

PhET Interactive Simulations

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

Author/Presenter

The PhET Sims Team

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2020
Short Description

Collection of 158 free interactive math and science simulations from University of Colorado Boulder. Engage students in math and science practices, and virtual labs, during remote learning. Find over 2,000 sim-based lessons under teacher resources. 

In Praise of Messy Data

Gould, R. R., S. Sunbury, & Dussault, M. (2014). In praise of messy data: Lessons from the search for alien worlds. The Science Teacher, 31.

Author/Presenter

Roy Gould

Susan Sunbury

Mary Dussault

Year
2014
Short Description

Lessons from the search for alien worlds.

Using online telescopes to explore exoplanets from the physics classroom

The search for habitable planets offers excellent opportunities to advance students’ understanding of core ideas in physics, including gravity and the laws of motion, the interaction of light and matter, and especially the nature of scientific inquiry. Thanks to the development of online telescopes, students can detect more than a dozen of the known exoplanets from the classroom, using data they gather, assess, and interpret for themselves. We present a suite of activities in which students apply basic physics concepts to their investigations of exoplanets.

Author/Presenter

Roy R. Gould

Susan Sunbury

Ruth Krumhansl

Year
2012
Short Description

Authors present a suite of activities in which students apply basic physics concepts to their investigations of exoplanets. The activities were developed and successfully tested with physics and earth science teachers in secondary schools in 14 states.

Thinking Scientifically in a Changing World

Shifting people’s judgments toward the scientific involves teaching them to purposefully evaluate connections between evidence and alternative explanations.

Lombardi, D. (2019). Thinking scientifically in a changing world. Science Brief: Psychological Science Agenda, 33(1). Retrieved from https://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2019/01/changing-world.aspx

Author/Presenter

Doug Lombardi

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2019
Short Description

Shifting people’s judgments toward the scientific involves teaching them to purposefully evaluate connections between evidence and alternative explanations.

Scaffolding Scientific Thinking: Students’ Evaluations and Judgments During Earth Science Knowledge Construction

Critical evaluation underpins the practices of science. In a three-year classroom-based research project, we developed and tested instructional scaffolds for Earth science content in which students evaluate lines of evidence with respect to alternative explanations of scientific phenomena (climate change, fracking and earthquakes, wetlands and land use, and formation of Earth’s Moon).

Author/Presenter

Doug Lombardi

Janelle M. Bailey

Elliot S. Bickel

Shondricka Burrell

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2018
Short Description

The present paper documents a quasi-experimental study where high school Earth science students completed these instructional scaffolds, including an explanation task scored for evaluative levels (erroneous, descriptive, relational, and critical), along with measures of plausibility reappraisal and knowledge.