Nathalie Martimbeau
As a further effort to embark on the new education goals for CASCA, I decided to begin a regular column to make a connection with the planetarium and science centre community. It is well know to them, and may not be to CASCA members, that the main business for planetaria is astronomy education. They have been doing it for a long time and dare I might say are pretty good at it. They could use help from the CASCA community, so my goal is to make us aware of what is being done and encourage you to contribute. Canada has six major informal astronomy education centres (planetaria or science centres). In this article, you will find a quick review of their latest innovations from this last spring and for the summer of 2002.
Engaging Science is now in its 6th year and provides hands on enrichment workshops to teachers. It is a joint venture partnership of the H. R. Macmillan Space Centre, the Vancouver Aquarium and Science World. There are now a total of six workshops with three more under development , a variety of learning resources, and an "learning" component. This year Macmillan is expanding the program to Alberta and Ontario through partnerships with science centres in those provinces. Macmillan receive many letters commending this program, and one of the things that teachers really value is the ability to take the workshops into the classroom on the next day if they wish.
Sharing Space, a high school mentorship program, provides high school Career Preparation students, and University students with an opportunity to share the wonders of space with elementary school children in their community. The high school students receive training and simple resources and conduct workshops for the elementary students. "This program is rapidly growing in popularity, and one of the benefits for me" says John Dickenson "is that I am really encouraged by the quality of the high school students involved with the program. They are talented, enthusiastic, have strong values and are wonderful examples to the younger students."
Project North Star is a national program in which Macmillan is taking the lead role. It is all about the ISS and Canada's contributions to the science and technology. It is delivered in both languages (English and French) and includes an ISS Fact Sheet, a stage show script and resources, and school outreach kits. Not all is yet available as it is a three year program. The materials are developed in consultation with 8 other science centres in Canada, and will be delivered by those facilities as part of their school and public programming.
Macmillan is also researching the possibility of offering French language school programs at their facility to "French Immersion" schools. This will require grants or sponsorships so Macmillan is doing a market analysis before they start applying for funding.
The staff are nearing completion of a complete suite of curriculum-oriented school shows for the Centre's Discovery Dome Theatre. They now offer a program at each grade level from K to 6, with each show concentrating on a key science topic at the core of that grade's science curriculum. The topics are not always astronomy, and dome shows cover Small Animals, Sound, Light & Shadow, Weather, as well as Sky Science. Large format films such as Bears and Beavers are also offered to all grade levels.
On May 2, visiting classes at the Science Centre participated in Space Day, with a highlight being a live two-way connection to astronaut Chris Hadfield who was in Moscow training at Star City. Selected kids from an audience of 200 were able to ask questions of Hadfield. The exclusive link was setup courtesy of the Canadian Space Agency. On April 8, astronaut Dave Williams visited the Science Centre in person as part of a nationwide tour and gave a talk to several invited classes.
The Science Centre continues to operate the hugely popular Open Minds program, sponsored by Chevron Resources. In this program, a class spends a week at the Science Centre in an intensive 5 days of science activities and projects. Next year, sky science (what teachers call astronomy!) will occupy the single largest allotment of Open Minds weeks (other weeks are devoted to electricity, simple machines, biology, and other Grade 3 to 6 topics).
For the public, the Science Centre also participated in the American Astronomical Society's Second Century Lecture series by bringing in Dr. Paul Butler from the Carnegie Institution to present a public talk on Extrasolar Planets: a First Reconnaissance. Dr. Butler's talk on April 16 kicked off a week of telescope viewing of the five naked-eye planets uniquely lined up in the evening sky last April. In all, about 7,000 people were able to view at least some of the planets through telescopes staffed by members of the Calgary Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. Telescopes were set up at various locations around the city, including at the Science Centre and at the University of Calgary's Rothney Astrophysical Observatory. Lineups at the telescopes at all locations broke all records, surpassing even those for Shoemaker-Levy 9 in 1994 and Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997.
For the summer, as most science centres do, the Calgary facility offers weekly summer science camps for the public. The main exhibit will be "Experience Space" featuring various body-on exhibits that simulate the rigours of astronaut training. A 70mm film, To Be an Astronaut, accompanied by a short Digistar "star show" called FreeFall, will be the main Discovery Dome attraction. A new children's show, The Super Sky Show, starring puppets projected on video, will be offered to young children. The show features a mock late-night talk show format, with constellation and planet puppet guests being interviewed by genial host, Seymour Sky. The show will be sold to other planetariums around the world.
The Odyssium, located in Edmonton, has been conducting teacher astronomy in servicing for more than 15 years. The majority of the teachers who attend are elementary and are either teaching the subject for the first time or are looking for ways to make the subject more appealing to the kids. Our workshops are hands-on with many take home activities including star clocks, planispheres, comet recipes and constellation identification worksheets. At the end of the workshop teachers have the opportunity to go into the planetarium and not only learn a little about how to find their way around the sky but also to put their new found planispheres and star clocks to use.
If the weather is nice, those that are interested take a short trip to the on-site observatory to look through telescopes. The 2.5 hour workshops are held twice a year and are well attended. Comments from teachers include "this is what all workshops should be like" to "I did not know it was this easy to learn about the night sky".
The Manitoba Planetarium is running a new school program, The Solar System Workshop, to address the pan-Canadian science curriculum for Grade 6. The program addresses the "Exploring the Solar System" cluster, and includes a planetarium component as well as a classroom component.
The planetarium presentation is a live and interactive experience, using the dome as a portal to explore the night sky and the planets of the solar system. Students discover the reasons behind the apparent motions of the sky, and then leave Earth for a whirlwind tour of the solar system. Demonstrations are used in the theatre when appropriate to reinforce celestial concepts. Student questions can be accommodated by the live format, sending the show in unpredictable directions.
The hands-on workshop component occurs in a classroom, and highlights Canadian contributions to space exploration, particularly the Radarsat Earth observation satellites. Students learn the basics behind remote sensing technology, and then use their knowledge to map the surface on an unknown planet. This untitled planet's surface is completely swathed in clouds, rendering it invisible. Teams of students are each provided with a covered wooden box containing a 3-D model of one region of the planet inside it. The students must map the planet by inserting "radar" probes through holes in the wooden lids (the "cloud cover"), tabulate the elevation at each point, organise their data, and then combine data with their colleagues in order to create a complete map. The finale is a discussion of the topography of the larger region of the planet and the selection by consensus where they would land a robot lander.
The program has been extremely popular, forcing Planetarium staff to expand their available space to accommodate the demand. The 2-hour programme provides a full space-science experience and allows students to make the most of their planetarium visit.
Although the Ontario Science Centre shut down their planetarium, the McLaughlin Planetarium, in 1995, daily planetarium shows are still offered to their visitors in a STARLAB (see the STARLAB website http://www.starlab.com) - a portable inflatable dome. The current show takes the visitors on a fascinating journey through our Solar System and beyond. The shows are live, and feature a "hot topics" section at the beginning of every show to keep the visitors up to date with the latest discoveries. A new show, entitled "Wonders of the Canadian Sky" offers a look at perspectives of the Canadian sky over the past 500 years.
In case people are interested*, a group of scientist, educators and ordinary citizens have join together to start a group called the Planetarium Renaissance Group. Their goal is to save Toronto's McLaughlin Planetarium from destruction. Please see the following link for more information:
http://www.geocities.com/torontoplanetarium/home.html
The staff is currently completing the French to English translations of their educational activity sheets designed to help teachers and students prepare for a trip to attend school shows. They are available on the following website:
http://www2.ville.montreal.qc.ca/planetarium/Planetarium/Scolaires/index_a.html#Fiches.
The six copies of the Moon Explorer's Kit are assembled and the production of the guides and activity scenarios are in progress. September 2002 is the target date for launch of this new classroom kit. The pre-production work on a new kit on Mars Exploration, which will include robotic and remote sensing activities, is on its way. This new kit should be available before the end of the year. All classroom kits are rented out to schools for three to four week periods for a small fee ($50 to $60). The very popular Solar System Exploration Kit will be revamped after being loaned out for six years to several hundreds of schools in Quebec.
Also in preparation is a new school show for kids ages 4-6, which will replace "Magic Night" starting September 2002. This new show will be produced by the Planétarium and addresses the new pre-school, elementary and secondary programmes of the Quebec Ministry of Education.
I would like to thank the following people for their contribution to this column: Pierre Chastenay (Planétarium de Montréal), John Dickenson (MacMillan Space Science Center), Alan Dyer (Calgary Science Center), Sara Poirier (Ontario Science Centre), Max Scharfenberger (Odyssium), George Wurtak (Manitoba Science Museum).
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Nathalie is a member of the CASCA Education Committee. She is currently at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and formerly from the Planétarium de Montréal. |
* Please note that this "advertizement" is solely by the author and is not the view of the Ontario Science Centre.