Update 1/13: Would help if I use the proper hashtag in the title. Fixed!
With one trip done, I’m really looking forward to tomorrow’s road trip to Science Online 2011 in North Carolina. This is my first time at the “open conference” or “unconference” about communicating science on the internet. There will be museum tours, workshops, and book discussions on Friday, followed by panel discussions on Saturday and Sunday. I’m starting to put together my weekend schedule now, drawn to things like “How to produce a high-quality short video” and “Alternative Careers for Scientists: from grad school to writing for Main Stream Media.”
If you couldn’t make the registration before it closed, you can still be a part of the conference by watching the livestream here.
I look forward to meeting a lot of people there who I’ve only heard of or talked to online, as well as seeing distant friends. If you are reading this and are going, please say hello! I’m, uh, the really short one.
Wait, no that’s not right. I am a Grassroots Skeptic. Check out my guest post over at GRSkeptics on my skeptical nature, and how I think working with kids in our astronomy program can help grow little skeptic-lings. And a tiny plea for help with our voting-drive. Yay! After a session with our DSBKers, my jeans may be grass-stained, however.
One instance from DSBK that just came to mind, regarding critical thinking, is when one student asked, “Doesn’t science create bad stuff that can hurt people?” Quite a weighty, and a very good, question from such a young person, and I’m glad we had the opportunity to show that science creates a lot of things. Though some can be used for good and others bad, we need to learn to use these tools wisely. The very goal of our program is to show these kids that they can understand science, and with understanding we can properly wield this great responsibility that our scientific advancements have given us. It’s a running theme in one of my favorite books, Carl Sagan’s Demon-Haunted World, so I’m glad that DSBK can serve in one small part to further that understanding.
Oh, and there’s a fantastic mints-and-soda demo in there as well. Go check it out.
Thanks to K.O. Myers for having me as a guest on the blog!
If you know me in person, you’ve probably heard me talk on and on about Dark Skies, Bright Kids, aka DSBK. This is an astronomy club for elementary school kids in Albemarle County, run by volunteers from the Astronomy Department at the University of Virginia. We visit a different school every semester, meeting with the same group of 3rd through 5th graders every week, showing them in a hands-on way just how fun science can be! We teach about rockets, …
… comets,…
… light,…
… the wonders of the night sky,…
… and so much more. We’ve been able to reach out to a fantastic group of kids and show them the wonders of science through astronomy. They live in a beautiful rural county with gorgeous dark skies, but don’t always have the resources with which to explore them.
Though our volunteer effort is only large enough to handle one group per semester now, we’re looking to extend our reach by publishing a children’s book about astronomy and distributing it to every 3rd grade public school classroom in Virginia. This takes money, and we’ve applied for a Pepsi Refresh Grant to make this happen. All YOU need to do is sign up at the site and vote for our project. You can vote for us once a day, every day, in the month of September!
Book excerpt. Click to embiggen!
I’ve been voting for a bit now for other projects, and haven’t noticed any new spam and no emails from this particular website. If you are really worried, use an email address that you don’t use for your real work or contacts. (But only vote ONCE! Please, don’t vote from multiple email addresses.) DO, however, vote everyday and pass this along to your friends, family, organization, or Facebook and Twitter contacts if you would like to help.
If you have an audience of your own (a blog, a radio show, a podcast, a website, etc.) we would be SUPER appreciative if you passed this on through those means as well! (BIG THANKS to those who have already done or agreed to do so!) Every vote, every day is going to count to get us closer to our goal, and help science education across Virginia.
Want to know more? Please check out our website where we have our mission statement, pictures, links, and free lesson plans of some of our activities that can be adapted for the classroom or home! Feel free to contact us using the email on the website, or me personally, if you have any questions or want to help. And if you are in Charlottesville or Albemarle and really love astronomy outreach, we could use boots-on-the-ground volunteers as well!
In preparation for tomorrow’s meeting of Dark Skies, Bright Kids, we decided to test our comet making skills before we unleashed 17 elementary school kids upon our activity. We’re making a physical analog of a comet, with dirt, water, sand, syrup (for the organic molecules), and a little bit of ammonia (a spritz of glass cleaner), all frozen over with dry ice. All we had today was a little bit of dirt I dug up outside the astronomy department (shhh, don’t tell the groundskeepers), some water, and the dry ice, but we had to get an idea of how much material we would need tomorrow for each kid to have a comet, and how best to pack these things together. Educators, always practice your demos! For your own sanity.
The best way to get things good and cold is to use really fine dry ice. So we gave Paul a hammer and set him on his way to go all 2001 on it.
I’m going to smash it, WITH A HAMMER!
Make some mud, mix in some ice, pack together… voila! Your very own outgassing comet!
Gail gives her outgassing comet a little help
They are dark, just like real comets. Although we think of them as bright, icy objects, their albedos are actually quite low. (Albedo is a measure of how reflective an object is, where 0 is completely black and 1 is perfectly reflective.) Astronomers use infrared and optical telescopes to measure the size, brightness, and albedo of comets and find them to be as dark as asphalt! So our frozen mudballs were pretty close. Also, as it warms, you can see the carbon dioxide gas come off, and if you are really good, blow it out into a tail.
Do NOT handle dry ice with your bare hands. I’m not very bright.
I hope to soon get pictures of the kids making comets as well! But of course, we don’t have image release forms from all their caregivers just yet, so enjoy the big kids playing with dirt for now.
This past weekend, I batted my eyelashes at Tim to go to the Hayden Planetarium with me once I discovered it was a few blocks away from a wedding we were attending. We took all of Saturday afternoon to catch the latest planetarium show and browse the rest of the American Museum of Natural History. He had never been there, and I gravitated towards my favorite parts of the museum. We wandered around the Rose Center (mostly the Space part) and I rambled on and on about subsections of the exhibits, pointing out where our friends’ research projects lie, and that nice blank part of the universe’s timeline where the epoch of reionization and dark ages research will help fill in. Then, we went straight for the dinosaurs on the fourth floor, because, who doesn’t love dinos?! We wandered around the fossils, dodging kiddies and their overzealous picture-taking parents. There’s only so much of the mass of information that one can hope to absorb in any one visit, and I’m just trying to keep my sauropods and theropods and ornithischians straight. However, I did notice a subtle theme in many of the exhibit commentary. Here’s an example (check out the yellow box in particular):
Click for dinosaurian biggness!
Maybe I’m just paranoid (especially since Tim didn’t pick up on this until I pointed it out) but there were a number of displays asserting that the science doesn’t tell us the truth, or we’ll never know the answers, because the fossil evidence in incomplete or because the animals are not here to study directly. Although it’s a fair point to say that science doesn’t prove any theory beyond a shadow of a doubt, and that extracting answers from the tiny bits of fossils we do find is excruciating, tedious, and not exact, it was an odd point to be hammering home in a science display. After all, I personally marvel at what knowledge we can glean from incomplete evidence and at the self-correcting nature of science. That’s the kind of message I would send, especially in this era of mistrust and misunderstanding of science by so many people.
So, after we got our fill of dino fossils and expensive but admittedly delicious museum food, we headed to one of my other favorite areas, the Hall of Human Origins. I love to wonder what life was like for early hominids, including for those of our own species who were physically identical, but living in a totally different world 150,000 years ago. I marvel at the tenacity of Homo erectus who populated the Earth for 1.5 million years, whereas we’ve been here for a fraction of that. Anyway, as I was browsing, I noticed that the displays read differently than in the fossil halls:
Click for large version.
It asks a question, states that we don’t yet know, but that it is an area of active research. It puts forth a guess based on the best of our knowledge and leaves the reader wondering what we’ll find out next. This, I think, is far more exciting and educational and doesn’t do the whole process of science a disservice.
This was the first time that I looked beyond the information in an exhibit to the style of the presentation. It is important to know who your audience is and what message you want to send whenever doing science outreach or teaching. Students and museum patrons are probably not going to retain much specific information. Good teachers are aware of this and try to get across a general message about science and have to be cognizant of what that message is. It’s not easy to do this, but having a goal is a good start. You can tell that the designers of the different exhibits have different goals, or at least different opinions on what it is about science they want to convey. For what it’s worth, I think the latter example is going to be much more helpful in conveying the true nature of science to those who don’t live it everyday. And after all, isn’t that important? Isn’t that kind of transparency and understanding just what science needs?
So, I just finished watching, and being very entertained by, “The Pluto Files,” a NOVA special by Neil deGrasse Tyson. Go watch it. Seriously! I’ll wait…
There was a part where Clyde Tombaugh’s son was showing off some of his father’s homemade telescopes, including one that had an axle of a Buick. And I thought, where have I seen something like that before? Ah yes, in good old Green Bank…
NRAO/AUI
Grote Reber’s famous home-made radio telescope had wheels from a Model T Ford on the azimuth track. And I realized, oh my goodness, there are SO many stories about the birth and history of radio astronomy that have not made their way to the public, even the astronomically interested public! I’m not sure if it is because radio is less relatable than optical astronomy, or if the field is just too young. But there are so many tales and stories of do-it-yourself, swashbuckling radio astronomy that deserve their own TV specials. The engineers-turned-astronomers, the new windows on the universe, the quirky characters and finicky equipment and crazy ideas that turned out brilliantly… they all make for some seriously entertaining story-telling.
Karl Jansky, the discoverer of radio waves from space, came upon this rather serendipitously, as my advisor explains in a 365 Days of Astronomy podcast. Grote Reber took up the field all on his own with a homemade dish, mapping the entire galaxy at night while still working his day job. The NRAO archives overflow with every scrap of note paper and every little bolt that this brilliant and obsessive man collected and kept. Some of the older astronomers fondly tell Reber stories over dinner. Ruby Payne-Scott gave the male establishment the old “poo-poo to you” and blazed a trail for radio astronomy in Australia after World War II. The Green Bank Observatory alone is chock full of interesting tales, which have been conveniently pulled together in a book, “But It Was Fun” which you can of course pick up in the gift shop (or borrow my copy!) I was lucky enough to have a radio astronomy graduate class that was taught in part by Jim Condon, who can tell all of the most fascinating tales and stories, including how the 300-foot telescope collapsed while taking his data. And, oh my gosh, anyone who has seen the infamous 140-foot telescope construction video, you know that’s fodder for laughter and terror all at once.
Jim Condon with the Jansky telescope replica
There’s so much to be told here, and only a few in the “in-crowd” are privileged to hear the tales, sometimes right from the horse’s mouth, so to speak. So, you know, all of those filmmakers or aspiring filmmakers who read this blog (all 0.2 of you), this stuff is entertaining! Or anyone who wants to teach me how to properly shoot and edit web video, you know, let’s do lunch.
… with a not-so-little Saturn V. Starring Pluto Little Dippy, last semester’s mascot for Dark Skies, Bright Kids.
We’re doing a kickoff party today for a new school, yay! If you don’t hear from me in a few days, it’s probably because I’ve been trampled by 80 over-enthusiastic kidlets. Wheeeee!
Forgive me, I’m sleep deprived, and it’s just the first night of the American Astronomical Society meeting in Washington, DC. (Check out #aas and #aas215 on Twitter. If you really want to sink your teeth into the event, Astrosphere will be live-streaming a bunch of talks and press conferences!)
But I will press on sleepily for a short post… the Dark Skies, Bright Kids project at UVa is putting together a book! To learn more about this great outreach program being developed by Dr. Kelsey Johnson and a number of post-docs, grad students, and undergrads at UVa, come to our poster on Tuesday (445.01). I promise, once the website is up and rolling, I’ll post a link here as well. One of the group members, Laura Jackson, created some lovely artwork to explain various astronomical concepts in English and in Spanish to the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th graders. The rest of the DSBK team pitched in to create a booklet, of which we will have a few copies to give away at the AAS. If you are interested in astronomy outreach to this age group, please come to our poster and check it out. Here’s a teaser:
For those of you that follow along on twitter, a little while ago I asked for some help finding space and astronomy songs for our Dark Skies, Bright Kids end of semester party. And did I mention that my twitter friends are freaking awesome! I got TONS of lists and suggestions and promised to compile a list once I had it all done. For the party itself, I threw these all together into a big playlist and just hit “shuffle.” For listing purposes, I tried to separate the more educational songs from the pool of general space song awesomeness. This also includes suggestions from our other club members here at UVa. Where possible, I’ve provided links for you to download (if free) or buy these songs. Enjoy, and feel free to add even more to the comments!
Of a more educational bent:
"Glorious Dawn" by Colorpulse ft. Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking - song, video, and more
"Far (365 Days of Astronomy Theme)" by George Hrab - song and video
"Cosmic Carl" by Dr. Paul Shuch aka Dr. SETI - mp3 and MORE songs
"Galaxy Song" by Monty Python - video
from Here Comes Science by They Might Be Giants (really, get the whole album!)
- Science is Real - video
- Meet the Elements - video
- What is a Shooting Star?
- How Many Planets? - video
- Why Does the Sun Shine? - new version and old version
- Why Does the Sun Really Shine? - video
- Roy G. Biv - video
- Put It to the Test - video
- Speed and Velocity - video
- Solid Liquid Gas
"Stars by the Colors" by Alan Marscher - song and lyrics and more songs
AstroCapella by the Chromatics - buy the CD or sample free songs
"Elements Song" by Tom Lehrer - video
"Interplanet Janet" by Lynn Ahrens for SchoolHouse Rock - video
(I could not find the Man or Astroman version! Help?)
"The Planet Song!" from Blue's Clues - song and others
"Yakko's Universe Song" from Animaniacs - video
"Our Solar System" from Animaniacs - song and video
"Big Bang Theory" by Barenaked Ladies - video
For the fun, spacey, and starry-eyed songs, stay tuned for part II…
This semester, a number of astronomers at UVa are participating in a project called Dark Skies, Bright Kids. Each week, a group head out to a local elementary school and do astronomy-related project with the third, fourth, and fifth graders who have joined the astronomy club. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to join the Friday afternoon activities, but I did help out at one of the evening observing sessions on a clear Friday night in October.
Waiting on the sun to go down…
We set up a Galileoscope to look at Jupiter and an 11-inch telescope to look at everything else. The kids arrived and were given glow bracelets so that we could see them in the dark. That was a very good idea, since the kids were so excited to be in their school’s playground in the dark, all they wanted to do was run. And RUN. And play around on the playground equipment. And RUN. A few times we were able to shepherd them back to the telescopes where the other grad students were entertaining the parents, and they would look through and say “Wow!” Kelsey Johnson, our fearless leader on this project, had plenty of worksheets for the students to do, and then they would run off again.
I decided, if you can’t fight them, join them! I joined their game, where they were pretending to be orphans living in the woods together… I was their pet unicorn that could hunt with my horn… really. From there, I could try and tie in astronomy to our game. Kids in the woods need to tell directions, right? Let’s look at the North Star. Well a unicorn is sort of like a horse… with wings… oh look, Pegasus! I could usually entertain them for a bit before they’d run off or turn back to the game. Later, Ryan, another one of the grad students helping out, took some of the kids over to look at another constellation. A few minutes in, they all start telling him about Pegasus. I was shocked… although they had been talking and laughing and running, they were not only paying attention but they were absorbing they information! Kids are amazing. And kudos to those brave teachers that work with them day in and day out.
I’m a brand new post-doc in astronomy working as part of the CosmoQuest team. My thesis focused on radio astronomy instrumentation. That means, I got to build cool telescopes that will open up new frontiers in the universe. I also love to teach, both in a classroom setting and informally. I'm happy to talk about the universe with anyone who will listen, and I am skeptically curious about all things.
I’m a brand new post-doc in astronomy working as part of the 
