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AstroBetter blog posts on teaching.

Workshops

Websites

  • Journal of Astronomy & Earth Sciences Education - A new peer-reviewed, open-access journal for scholars interested in disicpline-based education research.  Partially fills the void created by the termination of the Astronomy Education Review.
  • Astronomy Education Review - This was an AAS-sponsored journal, and many innovations in Astro 101 teaching were published there. This is an excellent place to start your thinking about astronomy education. It may be that some of your ideas and thoughts are also being studied by other people and you can benefit by building on their work. The journal archives are free to view and download.
  • PhysPort (formerly the PER User's Guide) - A searchable compilation of teaching resources and strategies supported by physics and astronomy education research. Sort by topic (e.g., astronomy), course level, instructor effort required, what skills you want students develop, etc. In the process of expanding to include research-based assessment resources and virtual teaching workshops.
  • ASP: Guide to Resources for Teaching Astro 101
  • Additional Guides to Resources
  • College-Level Astronomy Courses - links to course pages that include course material which can be used for inspiration.
  • NASA Education Resources (NASA Wavelength)- comprehensive collection of NASA resources
  • ComPADRE: Astronomy Center - a library of digital materials for teaching college-level introductory astronomy, sponsored in part by the AAS and the American Association for Physics Teachers. Has many links to other sites.
  • Astrobites - A daily digest of astro-ph articles, written by graduate students at a level appropriate for undergraduate physical science majors. Could be used in the classroom in various ways: see this article for suggestions.
  • Science Education Initiative (SEI) / CSWEI - materials and videos related to faculty professional development and course transformation, from CU Boulder and UBC, including guides for developing learning goals and multiple-choice assessments
  • International Astronomical Union's Working Group on Astronomy Education: Theory & Methods

Online Courses and Textbooks

Animations and Simulations

Videos and Podcasts

Misconceptions

  • Misconceptions about Science
  • Physics Misconceptions
  • Looking up papers about students' understanding of specific concepts would yield results for this (light and spectroscopy, gravity, lunar phases, stellar properties, cosmology, force and motion, etc.)

Laboratory Activities

Blogs

Email List

  • astrolrner - This email list has been around for over a decade now, and is filled with experts in the field. The list is moderated, so usually the signal-to-noise is very high. The archives may also answer the questions you have about your class.

Social Media

  • Facebook/AstronomyEducation -  This Facebook group is filled with people interested in teaching astronomy at a variety of levels.
  • Facebook/CAE - This is the Facebook group for the NASA/JPL Center for Astronomy Education hosted the University of Arizona.

Books

  • Learner-Centered Astronomy Teaching: Strategies for ASTRO 101 - discusses leaner-centered concepts and how to implement them.
  • Cosmos in the Classroom conference series in teaching introductory astronomy is available at the Astronomy Society of the Pacific website. The 2000, 2004 and 2007 editions are available in paper copy, and the 2010 edition will also be out soon. These series are not just filled with articles on astronomy education, but also contain handouts and activities from other astronomy instructors. There may be something you can adopt immediately for your class that has been developed by another instructor.
  • How People Learn - a general introduction to, you guessed it how people learn, based in part on research in cognitive science. Many aspects of the books are relevant to Astro 101 teaching, including the differences between how novices and experts solve problems.

Multiple Choice Questions

Resource Guides on Specific Topics

Journal Articles


Page last modified on Wednesday 20 of June, 2018 14:36:14 EDT