Education & Public Outreach Program Manager
The University of Arizona
Lunar and Planetary Science Department
http://www.hr.arizona.edu/27227xcox.htm

Salary:  $82K

Position Summary:
The University of Arizona, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory seeks a full-time
Education and Public Outreach Manager for the Phoenix Mars Mission under the
direction of Mr. Peter Smith. In cooperation with the Mars Exploration
Program education office and with oversight by authorized NASA HQ Office of
Space Science education officials, the E/PO Manager will be responsible for
the planning, management, and coordination of all formal and informal
education activities.


Duties and Responsibilities:
In collaboration with the Phoenix science and technology team members
implement a suite of formal education materials/products and resources
aligned with the Phoenix science objectives.
Alignment and coordination of formal and informal education activities with
the Mars Exploration Program (MEP) Education office; develop and coordinate
a series of informal educational activities, products and events aligned
with key Phoenix mission milestones.
Responsible for the management of Phoenix E/PO budget expenditures and
assume NASA HQ reporting requirements. Develop an end to end schedule of
activities, events and deliverables.
Ensure all partner institutions/organizations and co-investigators are
compliant with NASA guidelines.
Insure adherence to OSS E/PO policies and guidelines as they pertain to
various partner/collaborative organizations as well as all other general
legal requirements for federally funded research activities.
Function as representative for the Phoenix E/PO program at appropriate
professional society meetings and education events.
Responsible for insuring all educational products developed for the Phoenix
E/PO program are in alignment with Phoenix science objectives as well as
appropriate national education standards, are independently evaluated, and
are made available to the education community in accordance with NASA OSS
policies and requirements.
Coordinate participation of Phoenix scientific and technical team members
for various MEP and Phoenix public events.
Participate in other program, and activities such as workshops, MEP events,
and public presentations as required.
Perform other related duties as assigned.


Minimum Qualifications:
Bachelor's degree in relevant area of scientific expertise or in
science/mathematics education with a minimum of six years of relevant
experience leading a large science education program relevant to NASA Office
of Space Science content areas; OR,
Master's degree with four years of relevant experience identified above; OR,
Ten years of relevant experience in a formal science/mathematic
technological education setting with increasing duties that demonstrate
successful progression into a leadership/managerial role.
One year of full-time equivalent experience working with K-12 formal
education communities.
Knowledge and understanding of NASA E/PO goals. Experience with current Mars
Exploration Programmatic goals.
Ability to communicate and work effectively with scientific and technical
staff.
Ability to interact effectively with formal education community and address
current national science, mathematics and technology education requirements.
Demonstrated experience working effectively with underserved communities and
awareness of the unique educational needs of these communities.
Excellent communication skills and formal presentation skills.
Ability to work effectively as a Phoenix Team member and with diverse
national audiences with a wide range experience, interests and abilities.
Ability to adapt and function effectively in a fast-paced working
environment.


Preferred Qualifications:
At least three or more years of teaching experience in science, mathematics
or technology at the 6-12 grade levels.
At least three of more years of experience in design and development of
educational products and/or materials and/or programs.

APPLICATION DETAILS AT:  http://www.hr.arizona.edu/27227xcox.htm

Does anyone know where I can get a copy of Fox's moon hoax video
("Conspiracy Theory"), for educational purposes?

thanks,
Michael Faison

........................................................

January 3-4, 2004 Introductory Astronomy Teaching Workshops
(Both K-12 and College Teaching Workshops Are Available)


Learner-Centered Introductory Astronomy Teaching
January 3-4, 2004 at Hyatt Regency, Atlanta, GA
(Prior to the American Astronomical Society Meeting)

Astronomy provides a unique environment for teaching the excitement of
scientific inquiry to students. At the same time, high quality astronomy
teaching presents an ardent challenge because students who most often elect
to take astronomy courses are frequently apprehensive of science and
mathematics courses in general. Sponsored by the NASA JPL Navigator EPO
Program, these two-day, interactive teaching excellence workshops will focus
on dilemmas astronomy teachers face and develop practical solutions for the
troubling issues in curriculum, instruction, and assessment. The workshop
will occur January 3-4 in Atlanta.

In the workshops, after reviewing the latest research about how students
learn, participants will define and set measurable student learning goals
and objectives for students in their astronomy courses. To improve
instruction, participants will learn how to create productive learning
environments by using interactive lectures, peer instruction, engaging
demonstrations, collaborative groups, and tutorials. Participants will also
learn how to write more effective multiple-choice tests and implement
authentic assessment strategies including portfolio assessment, performance
tasks, and concept maps. Materials presented include resources from: (i)
Learner-Centered Astronomy Teaching, Slater & Adams, Prentice Hall, 2002;
(ii) Great Ideas for Teaching Astronomy, Pompea, Brooks Cole, 2000; (iii)
Lecture-Tutorials for Introductory Astronomy, Adams, Prather, & Slater,
Prentice Hall, 2002; and (iv) Insights into the Universe, Slater & Zeilik,
AAPT Press, 2003.

The K-12 Sessions will be composed of hands-on sessions using curriculum
modules and classroom-ready activities.  The college teaching sessions,
going on in parallel, focus on instructional strategies for working with
non-science majoring undergraduates.

For college faculty wishing to attend Sunday evening and Monday-day events
at the AAS conference, a special $25 registration fee is available.  Please
email aased@... for additional information.

PRESENTERS: The presenters Ed Prather and Tim Slater are astronomers in the
Conceptual Astronomy and Physics Education Research (CAPER) Team at
University of Arizona's Steward Observatory where their scholarship focuses
on the teaching and learning of astronomy. The workshop leaders have
published numerous articles and books on active learning in astronomy and
have coordinated curriculum development and professional development
projects for professional societies, NASA, and the National Science
Foundation. Additional presenters will also participate.

COSTS: Participants are responsible for their own travel and lodging
expenses. The majority of costs are being borne by the hosting professional
societies and the NASA JPL Navigator and SIRTF EPO Programs. You do not need
to be a member of the hosting society to attend the workshop.

ATLANTA WORKSHOP: Pre-registration is greatly appreciated, but not required,
by emailing your name, institutional contact information, which track you
wish to attend (K-12 or college) and email address to: caper@...
. It is strongly recommended that you attend BOTH days of the workshop.




.

I have set forth a number of personal goals for my introductory Astro
class this semester. One of them is to give students more exercises and
lab activities involving both the creation and interpretation of graphs.

Do you have any labs or other hands-on activities involving graphs that
you like to use? I have limited equipment, so "string and sticky tape"
experiments, simulations, or existing data is a must.

Also, if you have a lab manual posted on-line, would you send me the
reference?

Thank you so much,

Aaron Titus

On Thu, Jan 08, 2004 at 04:06:54PM -0500, Aaron Titus wrote:

> Also, if you have a lab manual posted on-line, would you send me the
> reference?

The labs we used last spring at Vanderbilt are online at:

   http://brahms.phy.vanderbilt.edu/~rknop/classes/a102/fall2003/labs/

"Labs To Do" has the link to the actual labs.  Some are set up to use a
suite of C-8's we have in our lab facility, and thus aren't useful to
somebody who doesn't have a similar facility.  However, some of the
naked-eye labs are something that could be done from almost anywhere.

-Rob

--
--Prof. Robert Knop
   Department of Physics & Astronomy, Vanderbilt University
   robert.a.knop@...

Do you have your students using any simple homemade instruments? There
are patterns for both a quadrant and cross-staff at:
	 http://zircon.as.utexas.edu/~rfrench/103l/pattern.html

You can teach the students about error analysis (random
versus/systematic, and sources of error), angular measurement, the small
angle formula and a variety of other things during a lab activity that
focuses on building and using the instruments in class. With the
cross-staff, I'd have the students break into teams and measure the
angular width of lab cabinets or doorways from a variety of distances
(team A at 2m, team b at 4m, etc), and then use Excel and a projector to
plot the results in real time. This shows that the best results come
from being far away from the cabinets (good way to start conversation on
error). While the students were taking their measurements, I'd identify
a few students with "unique" measuring techniques (and high measurement
error) and perfect technique, and during the discussion of error I'd ask
for volunteers to demonstrate how they took their measurements.
Inevitably at least a few of the bad and good examples would volunteer
and I'd bias who I selected to get the best and worst examples. This
opens up a good discussion on how human error always has a human cause
that can be identified.

Once you have these instruments, a variety of graphing labs become
possible. The most relevant may be measuring the change in angular
height over time of a nice bright star (the Sun is a star) near the
horizon (Venus is a good target right now). I used to take my class out
three times during a 1.5 hour lecture. The change is dramatic. Between
excursions outside I'd explain sidereal time, synotic time, and then the
lunar cycle. Their homework would be to measure the position of the Moon
at a set time for 1 week/4 observations and the position of the sun at
sunset for 1 month/15 observations.

There are also standard projects such as plotting an HR diagram of the
nearest stars and comparing it to an HR diagram of the brightest stars.
I found an online example of this at
http://www.real-system.com/astronomy/HRdiagram.htm

You can also graph the (either real or simulated) positions of Jupiter's
moons versus time to determine their masses (combine with lecture on
Kepler's laws and/or Galileo). Project CLEA offers software to do this
at http://www.gettysburg.edu/academics/physics/clea/juplab.html . You
can also do this using most desktop planetarium software or a small
telescope with a measuring eyepiece.

These are just a few of very many possibilities. Googling Astronomy +
Activity + Graph will bring up a bunch of ready to go activities.

Good Luck!
Pamela

Greetings!

An adjunct in my department is interested in finding a set of images for a
terrestrial body in all of the wavelengths (ie: radio, infrared, visible, uv,
etc). Yes, she knows several will be non-exciting. Has anyone seen a set of
these anywhere? Mars? The moon? Venus?

Donna

>An adjunct in my department is interested in finding a set of images for a
>terrestrial body in all of the wavelengths (ie: radio, infrared, visible,
>uv, etc).

I've known of two publicly available sets of images
one was a poster produced by, I believe, the National Radio Astronomy
Observatory (http://www.nrao.edu) of the Milky Way Galaxy

The pother was a slide set produced by the ASP. According to the last print
catalog from the ASP, this slide set seems to be discontinued, but the
adjunct might try contacting the ASP through their web site at
http://www.astrosociety.org or catalog@... via e-mail

Dave Bruning
Physics
University of Wisconsin-Parkside

NASA (the SIRTF science center, sirtf@...) has a nice new poster on
"The Multiwavelength Universe" that includes a series of pictures of the Moon
and Saturn (and some deep-space objects) at various wavelengths.

Alex Storrs
Department of Physics, Astronomy, and Geosciences
Towson University
8000 York Road
Towson, MD 21252-0001
Tel. 410-704-3003
FAX 410-704-3511


-----Original Message-----
From: astrolrner@yahoogroups.com [mailto:astrolrner@yahoogroups.com]
Sent: Thursday, January 29, 2004 4:48 PM
To: astrolrner@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [astrolrner] Digest Number 338



There is 1 message in this issue.

Topics in this digest:

       1. Across the Spectrum Images
            From: Donna Gifford <donna.gifford@...>


________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________

Message: 1
    Date: Thu, 29 Jan 2004 08:24:31 -0700
    From: Donna Gifford <donna.gifford@...>
Subject: Across the Spectrum Images

Greetings!

An adjunct in my department is interested in finding a set of images for a
terrestrial body in all of the wavelengths (ie: radio, infrared, visible, uv,
etc). Yes, she knows several will be non-exciting. Has anyone seen a set of
these anywhere? Mars? The moon? Venus?

Donna





________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________


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please contact T. Slater at tslater@... for more information.  To
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astrolrner-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com  -- >

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Hello,

Here is a link to the Multiwavelength Astronomy Gallery -- a lot of it is
galaxies etc., but there is one "gallery" of the Sun and the Moon in
X-ray, UV, visible, infrared and radio.

http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/cosmic_classroom/multiwavelength_astronomy/mu\
ltiwavelength_museum/gallery.html

Hope this is helpful,
Catherine

On Thu, 29 Jan 2004, Donna Gifford wrote:

> Greetings!
>
> An adjunct in my department is interested in finding a set of images for a
terrestrial body in all of the wavelengths (ie: radio, infrared, visible, uv,
etc). Yes, she knows several will be non-exciting. Has anyone seen a set of
these anywhere? Mars? The moon? Venus?
>
> Donna
>
>
>
>

A National Symposium on
Teaching Astronomy
for Non-science Majors

July 16 - 18, 2004
on the campus of Tufts University

     A 3-day hands-on symposium on teaching
introductory astronomy at the college level will be held
July 16 - 18th near Boston, Massachusetts. The
meeting is sponsored by the Astronomical
Society of the Pacific and NASA's New England
Space Science Initiative in Education, with
co-sponsorship from the American Astronomical
Society.

     The program includes components for veteran
instructors seeking to re-invigorate their teaching,
as well as for new instructors nervously
approaching their first classes.  Much of the
conference will involve panels and small-group
workshops with mentor instructors from around
the country.  Participants will also share information
and resources via poster papers and and a share-a-
thon.

     The conference will focus on how new results
from research into student learning can be
applied in the real world of our classrooms, on
alternatives to lecturing and multiple-choice tests,
on new resources for teachers and students, and
on how to address the needs of under-served groups.

     There will be lots of opportunities for networking
with other instructors from your area or who teach
in the same kind of setting you do.

     Scholarships to attend the meeting are available
for community college instructors, thanks to the
generous support of NASA/JPL's Navigator Program.

     For more information and registration instructions,
please see the meeting web site at:
http://www.astrosociety.org/events/cosmos.html

P.S. The meeting is also open to teachers
of high school level astronomy courses.


=================================
Andrew Fraknoi,  Chair: Astronomy Program,
Foothill College, 12345 El Monte Road,
Los Altos Hills, CA 94022, USA

Tel (Mon-Thur):  650-949-7288
Tel (Fri):  415-337-1100 x 120
FAX:  415-337-5205
E-mail: fraknoiandrew@...
==================================

Hello all,

I am a graduate student in astronomy & education at the University of
Michigan.  I am currently developing a 6-week middle school curriculum
on astronomy.  I'm hoping that there are people on this email
list who could give me some feedback on some aspects of this project.
  I apologize in advance for the length of this email.

To write this curriculum, I have begun by identifying learning goals
– content areas I want the students to learn by the end of the
unit – from Project 2061's Benchmarks for Science Literacy.
However, there turns out to be quite a bit of astronomy covered in
this document, compared to how much time this unit will last
(6-weeks).  I believe we will be more successful if we focus on and go
into depth on fewer topics.

I have pulled out a list of seven major learning goals that I can see
fitting together as a coherent unit.  These topics are:
•The sun and it's influence on the Earth (seasons)
•The sun is an average star
•The composition of the solar system
•The motion of objects in the solar system explaining phenomena
(including lunar phases and eclipses)
•Understanding Gravity
•Gravity's importance in the solar system
•The Earth's place in the solar system

I have left out the following topics that are also suggested by the
Benchmarks for Science Literacy:
•Our place in the Milky Way Galaxy
•The nature of galaxies
•Light travel time
•The motion of objects in the sky
•Use of telescopes in astronomy

If anyone is interested, I can provide more details on what I want to
cover on each of those topics.

My questions to this group are:
Do you think it will be feasible to cover the 7 major topics I have
listed in a 6-week unit?    Which areas do you think I should put more
emphasis on?  Are any topics that I am leaving out that you feel are
essential and should not be left out (given that this may be the
students' only exposure to astronomy in middle school science)?

The next phase of development for this project is to choose a
"driving question" – something that will tie the entire
unit together. It should be a) motivating for the students, b) not
immediately answerable, and c) rich enough that all of the learning
goals will be covered in the process of attempting to answer the
question.  If anyone has any suggestions for such a question, or even
a theme, I'd appreciate your ideas!

Thanks!
Julia Plummer

On Sun, Feb 15, 2004 at 02:03:12PM -0000, Julia Plummer wrote:
> ?The sun is an average star

It's not, really.  It depends on what you're taking the average of --
but something like 90% of the stars in the Galaxy are smaller, cooler,
less massive, and less luminous than the Sun.

A better way of saying it is that "the Sun is not an unusual star".
There are lots of other stars just like the Sun, there are lots which
are bigger and brighter and more luminous than the Sun, and there are
whole lots which are dimmer.

> The next phase of development for this project is to choose a
> "driving question" ? something that will tie the entire
> unit together. It should be a) motivating for the students, b) not
> immediately answerable, and c) rich enough that all of the learning
> goals will be covered in the process of attempting to answer the
> question.  If anyone has any suggestions for such a question, or even
> a theme, I'd appreciate your ideas!

Something like "exploring the solar system" would cover a lot of it.
You might be able to tie it with recent space missions, including
Galileo (which will be dumped down into Jupiter soon) and Cassini (on
its way out to Saturn), as well as the stuff going on at Mars right
now.  Your overarching goal seems to be understanding the context of
"home", where we define "home" as the solar system.  (As an
extragalactic astronomer, I tend to define "home" as the Milky Way, but
it's all a matter of scale.  Some people define home as a building at a
given point along a given block of a street-- all very provincial.)

-Rob

--
--Prof. Robert Knop
   Department of Physics & Astronomy, Vanderbilt University
   robert.a.knop@...

Position announcement:

Assistant Professor, Geoscience Education

The Department of Geography and the Office of Science and Math Education at
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville invites applications from persons
with teaching and research interests in Geoscience Education. The successful
candidate will conduct research/scholarly work in the specialty area of
Geoscience Education Research, and teach undergraduate and graduate courses
in the specialty and service courses for the Department.  The candidate will
be expected to obtain external funding and to publish the results of
scholarly work.  This person will have joint appointment with the
University¹s Office of Science and Mathematics Education and is expected to
work cooperatively with this office in support of in-service and pre-service
science teachers.  Requirements:  a Ph.D. in any area of geoscience/
physical geography or related field; ability to teach Earth Science,
Physical Geography and Geoscience Education courses at the undergraduate and
graduate levels; and ability to undertake Geoscience education
research/scholarly projects involving undergraduate and masters students.
The Geography Department has a full compliment of 11 faculty
(http://www.siue.edu/GEOGRAPHY) with current members supporting the
sub-disciplines of hydrology, biogeography, climatology, meteorology, as
well as economic and political geography.  The Department houses an advanced
24-seat Geographic Information System (GIS) laboratory, which is available
to all faculty for purposes of teaching and research   The Office of Science
and Math Education (http://www.siue.edu/OSME) is an interdisciplinary
collaboration encompassing 14 faculty members from both the School of
Education and the College of Arts and Sciences.  Candidates should submit a
letter of application, curriculum vitae, transcripts, a brief statement of
research plans (2-3 pages), a statement of teaching philosophy, and have
three letters of recommendation sent to:  Dr. Randall Pearson, Earth Science
Education Search Committee, Department of Geography, Southern Illinois
University Edwardsville, Edwardsville IL  62026-1459. Consideration of
applications will begin on March 1, 2004 and continue until the position is
filled.  As an affirmative action employer, SIUE offers equal employment
opportunity without regard to race, color, creed, religion, sex, age,
national origin, or disability.  SIUE is a state university ­ benefits under
state sponsored plans will not be available to holders of F1 or J1 visas.

--- In astrolrner@yahoogroups.com, dennis.brinkman@s... wrote:
> Julia,
> In response to your astrolrner post, my bias in astronomy education
places
> emphasis on observable phenomenon.  Rather than say "I'm going to
teach
> about these topics", I prefer to place importance on the things we
can
> observe.

Yes, that would be an interesting perspective to take.  This unit
will certainly be inquiry based.  And I think that there are a
variety of ways that we can include "observation" in a unit, in
addition to students' own observations of the actual night sky.  I'm
thinking in terms of utilizing the variety of collections of ground-
based and space-based observations of the solar system.

It would be interesting to use some type of initial set of
observations, that the students would make on their own at night, to
help create a question in the students' minds that they would need to
then further investigate through the course of the unit.

Thanks for suggesting your astronomy curriculum - I will take a look!

Julia

I'm teaching a 30 hour astronomy short course this summer to gifted
7th through 9th graders and also a 15 hour astronomy short course to
gifted 4th through 6th graders.  I have had 25 years of experience as
an amateur / quasi-professional astronomer and so have many ideas
about what I'd like to teach in the course, but it would be helpful
if each student had a "text" we could refer to and that they could
take with them when the course is over.

Can any of you recommend a good astronomy textbook for both of these
age groups?  I definitely want an observational emphasis, but except
for a couple of evening observing sessions, both courses will be
taught during the day.

Thanks much,

David Oesper
Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa

----- Original Message -----

From: David Oesper

To: astrolrner@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Monday, February 23, 2004 6:51 PM

Subject: [astrolrner] Any Good Texts for TAG Astronomy Short Course?

I'm teaching a 30 hour astronomy short course this summer to gifted
7th through 9th graders and also a 15 hour astronomy short course to
gifted 4th through 6th graders.  I have had 25 years of experience as
an amateur / quasi-professional astronomer and so have many ideas
about what I'd like to teach in the course, but it would be helpful
if each student had a "text" we could refer to and that they could
take with them when the course is over.

Can any of you recommend a good astronomy textbook for both of these
age groups?  I definitely want an observational emphasis, but except
for a couple of evening observing sessions, both courses will be
taught during the day.

Thanks much,

David Oesper
Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa





<-- This listserv is for discussions related to research in astronomy education; please contact T. Slater at tslater@... for more information.  To have yourself removed from this list, simply send email to:  astrolrner-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com  -- >

----- Original Message -----

From: Sheron Snyder

To: astrolrner@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2004 9:43 AM

Subject: Re: [astrolrner] Any Good Texts for TAG Astronomy Short Course?

Go to >http://handsonuniverse.org and download everything in site to fit your age group.  Focus on the Hands-On Universe Solar System stuff.

 

Yes, you will have to make your own copies, but then the student will be doing astronomy and more than the 'pretty' stuff.  I have used this material in several GAT programs. You may or may not need access to a computer lab, but that depends on what you choose to do.

 

here is a webpage with more than enough info to keep most people confused.

>http://www.cln.org/subjects/astronomy_inst.html

 

 

And definitely try these.  The body/hands then the mind must be engaged as these students will often leap over materials and head in to misconceptions.

 

Good Energy and Skill!  Let me know --off list--of course if I can be of help.

 

Sheron Snyder

PTRA'85

Hands-On Universe TRA

Retired HS Physics Teacher

part time Astronomy Instructor at Community College

and ;^)

all around helpful and fantastic person. giggle.

 

----- Original Message -----

From: David Oesper

To: astrolrner@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Monday, February 23, 2004 6:51 PM

Subject: [astrolrner] Any Good Texts for TAG Astronomy Short Course?

I'm teaching a 30 hour astronomy short course this summer to gifted
7th through 9th graders and also a 15 hour astronomy short course to
gifted 4th through 6th graders.  I have had 25 years of experience as
an amateur / quasi-professional astronomer and so have many ideas
about what I'd like to teach in the course, but it would be helpful
if each student had a "text" we could refer to and that they could
take with them when the course is over.

Can any of you recommend a good astronomy textbook for both of these
age groups?  I definitely want an observational emphasis, but except
for a couple of evening observing sessions, both courses will be
taught during the day.

Thanks much,

David Oesper
Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa





<-- This listserv is for discussions related to research in astronomy education; please contact T. Slater at tslater@... for more information.  To have yourself removed from this list, simply send email to:  astrolrner-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com  -- >



<-- This listserv is for discussions related to research in astronomy education; please contact T. Slater at tslater@... for more information.  To have yourself removed from this list, simply send email to:  astrolrner-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com  -- >

RE:  Good Texts

I am planning to use Sky and Telescope as the text in my undergraduate
astronomy survey course this fall.  S and T offers a 1 year on-line
subscription to all their articles for the last decade.  The original
texts and images are in pdf format for downloading or viewing on-line.
The cost is only $20 per year.  A simiar solution could work well with
niddle grades students.

Rico Tyler
Science Practitioner
Dept. of Curriculum and Instruction/Physics and Astronomy
Tate Page 324
Western Kentucky University
1 Big Red Way
Bowling Green Ky. 42101-3576

Rico.Tyler@...

270-745-6199

Greetings,

Tim Slater, Gina Brissenden and others started a database of journal
articles in astronomy education. This was hosted on a server at the Univ.
of Wisconsin-Madison until a couple of years ago. The site has since moved
to a new server. This "new" site maintained only a list of articles until
today -- a search engine now enables you to search by author, journal,
keyword, title, etc.  (suggestions for additional serach capability, etc
are welcome)

Please check out the database if you have an interest in astronomy
education research. ALSO, the entries are all contributed by volunteers; so
we can use some help keeping the list up to date and extending the
database. Information about contributing to SABER is on the web site

SABER -- http://shiva.uwp.edu/saber/

We hope you will find this useful!
Dave

Dave Bruning
Physics
University of Wisconsin-Parkside

I recently noticed that there is a variation in how I use the words
"young" and "old". I'm not an astronomer, so I can easily slip into
poor or inconsistent terminology. Sometimes I refer to distant objects
as "old" because those objects were formed at a relatively early time
in the universe and, assuming they are still around today, are "old"
(much older than the Earth, for example). However, because we see the
object as it was X billion years ago, we're seeing it when it was
"young". For example, a very distant quasar is a relatively "young"
object.

What is the best way to refer to young/old objects? For example, if
quasar A has a higher redshift than quasar B, would you say that A is
"older" than B or would you say that A is "younger" than B. Obviously,
we would be seeing a more distant object and its light from an earlier
time in the history of the universe, thus A is "young" when we are
seeing it. Yet, at a later date, comparing A and B, we would say A is
older.

Thanks,

Aaron

I think most astronomers discuss such things in terms of the object's
redshift. When they write or speak for the general public, they will
often "translate" to speak of distances in millions or billions of
lightyears, but such distance estimates are less precise than the
redshift, depending on which cosmological model you're subscribing to,
etc.

Since all light that reaches our eyes or instruments is "old" light, to
use terms such as young, old, etc, you'll have to do lots of explaining
and qualifying anyway.

-John

<not an astronomer either>

>>>>>
Subject: young/old

I recently noticed that there is a variation in how I use the words
"young" and "old". I'm not an astronomer, so I can easily slip into
poor or inconsistent terminology. Sometimes I refer to distant objects

as "old" because those objects were formed at a relatively early time
in the universe and, assuming they are still around today, are "old"
(much older than the Earth, for example). However, because we see the
object as it was X billion years ago, we're seeing it when it was
"young". For example, a very distant quasar is a relatively "young"
object.

What is the best way to refer to young/old objects? For example, if
quasar A has a higher redshift than quasar B, would you say that A is
"older" than B or would you say that A is "younger" than B. Obviously,

we would be seeing a more distant object and its light from an earlier

time in the history of the universe, thus A is "young" when we are
seeing it. Yet, at a later date, comparing A and B, we would say A is
older.
>>>>>>>

Yes, I also speak of redshifts. But would an object with high redshift
be an "old" object or a "young" object?

BTW I noticed that the heading of your reply says "SPAM". I was
wondering if my message made it to the list since I did not get a copy
and didn't get a reply. So thanks for the reply. I wonder though if my
message was interpreted as SPAM or something.

AT

On Friday, March 5, 2004, at 11:08 AM, John Rummel wrote:

> I think most astronomers discuss such things in terms of the object's
> redshift. When they write or speak for the general public, they will
> often "translate" to speak of distances in millions or billions of
> lightyears, but such distance estimates are less precise than the
> redshift, depending on which cosmological model you're subscribing to,
> etc.
>
> Since all light that reaches our eyes or instruments is "old" light, to
> use terms such as young, old, etc, you'll have to do lots of explaining
> and qualifying anyway.
>
> -John
>
> <not an astronomer either>
>
>>>>>>
> Subject: young/old
>
> I recently noticed that there is a variation in how I use the words
> "young" and "old". I'm not an astronomer, so I can easily slip into
> poor or inconsistent terminology. Sometimes I refer to distant objects
>
> as "old" because those objects were formed at a relatively early time
> in the universe and, assuming they are still around today, are "old"
> (much older than the Earth, for example). However, because we see the
> object as it was X billion years ago, we're seeing it when it was
> "young". For example, a very distant quasar is a relatively "young"
> object.
>
> What is the best way to refer to young/old objects? For example, if
> quasar A has a higher redshift than quasar B, would you say that A is
> "older" than B or would you say that A is "younger" than B. Obviously,
>
> we would be seeing a more distant object and its light from an earlier
>
> time in the history of the universe, thus A is "young" when we are
> seeing it. Yet, at a later date, comparing A and B, we would say A is
> older.
>>>>>>>>
>
>
> <-- This listserv is for discussions related to research in astronomy
> education; please contact T. Slater at tslater@... for more
> information.  To have yourself removed from this list, simply send
> email to:  astrolrner-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com  -- >
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>

I would tend to use distance as the descriptor when describing
quasars/galaxies.

BUT if one is trying to describe the earliest formed galaxies (describing
formation of galaxies), then it is appropriate to use the words young,
although I usually stick with "earliest formed" in any case. "Old" doesn't
fit here in my opinion.

The opinion of a stellar (not extragalactic) astronomer

Dave Bruning
Physics
University of Wisconsin-Parkside

Yes, some servers are routinely labeling items coming from listserv servers as
spam. Frustrating, now not only do you have to pull the spam out of the good
stuff, you also have to go in and find the good stuff among the spam!! One step
forward - two back.

Reminds me of a book I read ~ 30 years back. "Tools for Conviviality" by Ivan
Illich.
He was commenting on our ability to drive at 60 mph (100 km/hr for us Canucks)
and questioning if we were getting anywhere faster. Over much of the surface of
the world, and certainly in smoothed over or pathed populated areas, we can
essentially move about at 3 to 4 mph. (you convert!!) Well now, take your car
in which you might travel 10's of thousands of miles in a year, divide that by
the time you are driving in it (especially in stalled freeways) plus the time
you take to care for it plus the time you spend earning the money to pay for
it, the gas the insurance, the licenses, the maintenance etc - and what do you
get  - 3 to 4 mph. So are we getting anywhere faster??

Not astronomical - but pertinent to sense of accomplishment and frustration
with the "liberating tools" of our times.

Cheers & Clear Skies  -  Tom

--- In astrolrner@yahoogroups.com, "Tom Olien" <tom.olien@h...> wrote:
> Yes, some servers are routinely labeling items coming from listserv servers as
> spam. Frustrating, now not only do you have to pull the spam out of the good
> stuff, you also have to go in and find the good stuff among the spam!! One
step
> forward - two back.
>

My apologies for the Spam label. I replied from my office computer, and my
school
district's IT department has a spam filter that labels suspicious incoming mail
based on a
formula, and yes, virtually any "list" mail gets flagged. I usually remove the
"spam" label
when replying to a message (and remove the "digest" identifier too) but forgot
to in this
case.

-John

--- In astrolrner@yahoogroups.com, Aaron Titus <titus@m...> wrote:
> Yes, I also speak of redshifts. But would an object with high redshift
> be an "old" object or a "young" object?
>

When speaking to the public or school groups in the planetarium setting, I speak
of
distances (to M31, for example) in terms of light years, and explain what a
light year is,
and let groups ponder the fact that it took the light that produced these images
more than
2 million years to reach our photographic/telescopic lens. If the line of
questioning
persists, I refer to the light as being old light (traveled 2 million years to
reach our eyes)
and indicate that we are therefore seeing the galaxy as it was 2 million years
ago (e.g.,
when it was younger).

I don't often like to go into these discussions though, because it inevitably
gets thorny, i.e.
questions of simultaneity, etc., and way over the heads of many in the groups.

It also occasionally raises the spectre of the age of the universe, which can
bring in
questions from the YECs (young earth creationists) who may be in the occasional
program.
They're rarely satisfied with any explanation that dates the universe by
scientifically sound
methods.

-J