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Session 4 - Education: Telescopes, the Web and Curricula.
Display session, Wednesday, January 07
Exhibit Hall,
Through the use of the NASA 1997 Initiative to Develop Education through Astronomy (IDEA) grant, we have taken the first step in Internet Deployment in Elementary Astronomy education. This grant has motivated Jordan Elementary School (located in Chandler, Arizona) to invest in a large number of computers, so that each classroom can be equipped to use images from the Internet in class assignments. A home page for Jordan Elementary has been established, which includes an IDEA page. This page currently includes lesson plans for 4th through 6th grades, that incorporates many astronomical images which have been collected from various NASA web sites. These images with updated lessons are made available through Jordan's IDEA page. Access to information was just one aspect, the other being teacher education. Many teachers have had very little experience with the Internet and have not had any astronomy courses since they were in college or even elementary school. We, therefore, began with a seminar introducing the internet to the Jordan Elementary teachers. This lesson was then made available to the teachers through the Jordan home page to aid in the teachers' learning. Several additional seminars were held as an overview of the solar system, galaxies, and stars and to introduce the resources available through the newly created IDEA page.
