Prior to this, access may have been the province of the wealthier schools (Gould, Dussault, & Sadler Reference Gould, Dussault and Sadler2007). It is also these factors that have allowed remote observing on major research grade observatories to become technically feasible.ĭevelopments in IT even the playing field as less well-resourced schools can freely access such equipment and tools.
#Clea astrometry of asteroids full#
Other Information Technology (IT) developments, such as inexpensive hardware especially in terms of speed and capacity to share large amounts of data, and software to undertake a full analysis, have also contributed. 2000, Hollow, McKinnon, & White 1998), it is the recent development of fast internet infrastructure that has allowed high school research projects involving astronomy to scale up in recent years. While unimaginably slow by present day standards, early modems and bulletin board systems and then the Internet provided a method of ‘instantaneous’ and cheap long-distance delivery of these images (at least compared to sending the images through the post on disk), as well as the potential for remote control of the observatory itself.Īs it was noted while it was occurring (Baruch Reference Baruch2000, Sadler et al. In the early nineties, affordable charge-coupled device (CCD) cameras became available which delivered near-instantaneous images from telescopes rather than the previous long and tedious processing of photographic film (Baruch 1992). The capacity for true high school-based astronomical research has exploded over the last twenty years and this has a lot to do with rapid technological advancement. This reality is modelled much better by a research approach to learning in science than the traditional transmissive mode evident in high school science. In the modern world, regardless of whether the career is scientific or not, skills are generally built from many varied components drawn from a variety of traditional subject domains (Gilbert Reference Gilbert2005). It is also the case that traditional styles of schooling tend to compartmentalise learning into very discrete entities, such as English in English class or computing in computer science class.
Gifted students as well as underachievers and the easily bored can be motivated by tackling some of the ‘big questions’ that a typical everyday science class lacks (Hollow Reference Hollow, Pasachoff and Percy2005). In addition, some students demonstrate greater capabilities when they are exposed to study at depth than one would have previously expected from their in-class behaviour. While students can be excited by the breathtaking images in astronomy alone, through research a student can gain a sense of pride and ownership in their work, as well as gain useful secondary meta-skills such as organisational techniques and problem-solving approaches that become invaluable in later studies and work. Student research, pitched at an appropriate level, can be an effective approach to address the disenchantment about science that results from traditional ‘chalk’n’talk’ styles of teaching (Hollow Reference Hollow2000).
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