Shaw-IAU Workshops by the OAE

In many parts of the world, there are no advanced astronomical instruments or tools available to the public mainly because of budget shortage. As a result, people get discouraged and have limitations to make space activities and thus stick to only the theoretical approaches. However, there are many effective low-tech solutions that can be done with simple and cheap materials. Hands-on activities are very important to help students and teachers to understand the significance of Astronomical observations and phenomena. It creates a link between physical principles with everyday observations that leads to many of the more abstract and remote ideas to become more familiar. These activities will teach the students to focus on the experience and skills developed by using critical thinking. They are designed to be worked individually or in a group. These may include activities such as stargazing using free software or mobile apps, laboratory experiments, developing of tools & instruments and watching documentary videos. In most cases, Mathematics plays an important role in modeling these activities, and finally, the analysis is needed to arrive at the conclusions. Specifically, with these methods, there are some suggested traditional activities designed for collaborative learning in class or outreach programs such as constellation studies, lunar phases, modeling scales of distances, and sizes of celestial objects and planetary orbits.

Biography:

My name is Nebiyu Suleyman Mohammed. I have been the National Point of Contact for Ethiopia in Space Generation Advisory Council (SGAC) of the United Nations for over six years. Moreover, I am one of the members of the scientific committee in Ethiopian Space Science and Technology Institute.