How to Support UK Schools
This UK version of the highly successful Project Astro "How to manual for teachers and astronomers", has been updated and modified to account for differences between the US and UK educational systems. It has been produced as part of an STFC Science and Society Fellowship awarded to Paul Roche at Cardiff University.
To download a copy of the manual in full click here. The manual gives tips and helpful advice on the following areas:
- What makes a successful partnership
- Finding a partner teacher or astronomer
- Expectations and planning
- Integrating the astronomer into the classroom
- Getting started and the first visit
- Roles and responsibilities for teachers
- Roles and responsibilities for astronomers
- Involving the school and community
- Getting support and publicity
- Star parties, astronomy clubs, and other good ideas
- Software for schools
- Funding for events and/or groups
- Places to visit
Follow the appropriate link to find out the relevant information in the web version of the manual.
Children and Science
Children are born with a curiosity about the natural world. Like scientists, they explore, observe, experiment and classify. Sadly, for many children as they go through school, science begins to lose its fascination. They only know it seems boring (or not relevant to their lives), and when something is boring, not relevant, or too abstract, it's tough for children to put their minds to work.
The overall purpose of this project is to help students see that science can be interesting and fun, while getting them to think about the process and results of discovery. The goal of this project is not to make all children into professional, or even amateur, astronomers (although some students may eventually follow these paths). Rather, we want to use the wonder and fascination of astronomy to engage all students in the process of science and logical reasoning. This means we want students to behave like young scientists, by making observations, gathering and classifying data, drawing conclusions, and asking new questions. We want students to consider multiple explanations for a phenomenon, and use their data to reach the best conclusion. We want students to consider that sometimes there isn't one correct answer, or that people may disagree on the answer, or that we don't always know what the answer is, but we can devise a way to find out.
This project aims to focus on helping children learn using hands-on, concrete activities where students learn and make discoveries for themselves.
Incentives for Teachers and Astronomers
Teachers | Astronomers |
Students become more interested in science | Increase the number of university students enrolling for astronomy courses |
Will receive help from astronomers in teaching science | Opportunity to talk/share about astronomy |
Continuing professional development | Public service/giving something back to the society |