Shaw-IAU Workshops by the OAE

Schedule

• An Introduction to Evaluation for Astronomy Education Programs

  Wednesday Oct. 13, 2021
  UTC: 6 a.m. - 6:25 a.m. America/New_York: 2 a.m.- 2:25 a.m.

  Thursday Oct. 14, 2021
  UTC: 6:30 p.m. - 6:55 p.m. America/New_York: 2:30 p.m.- 2:55 p.m.

  Evaluation plays an important role in developing and revising astronomy education programs and activities as well as understanding the short and long-term impacts on students, teachers, and members of the public. This presentation will give an overview of different types of evaluation including internal and external evaluation as well as needs assessment, formative, and summative evaluation. We will cover the difference between different types of assessments used in evaluation and how these types of data can be used to gain valuable information about your astronomy education activities. We will provide resources for assessment and discuss the difference between astronomy education research and evaluation. Lastly, we will provide resources for getting started doing evaluation.

  

  Sanlyn Buxner (Planetary Science Institute & University of Arizona)

  For more information about this talk click here

• Evaluation Basics: Planning for Improvement and Measuring Impact

  Wednesday Oct. 13, 2021
  UTC: 6:25 a.m. - 6:40 a.m. America/New_York: 2:25 a.m.- 2:40 a.m.

  Thursday Oct. 14, 2021
  UTC: 6:55 p.m. - 7:10 p.m. America/New_York: 2:55 p.m.- 3:10 p.m.

  Evaluation is an important tool for improving astronomy education projects and assessing their impact. So how do you go about carrying out an evaluation? Learn about the key components of the evaluation process including identifying the goals of the evaluation, choosing the best data collection method, carrying out the study, analyzing the data, and sharing the results. This session will also share a number of resources to help support you in developing a basic evaluation plan of your own.

  

  Amy Grack Nelson (CAISE)

  For more information about this talk click here

• The Europlanet Evaluation Toolkit

  Wednesday Oct. 13, 2021
  UTC: 6:40 a.m. - 6:50 a.m. America/New_York: 2:40 a.m.- 2:50 a.m.

  Thursday Oct. 14, 2021
  UTC: 7:10 p.m. - 7:20 p.m. America/New_York: 3:10 p.m.- 3:20 p.m.

  In this presentation, we will give a practical guide to the Europlanet Evaluation Toolkit (http://www.europlanet-eu.org/europlanet-evaluation-toolkit/), a resource that aims to empower outreach providers and educators in measuring and appraising the impact of their activities. The toolkit is intended to provide advice and resources that can be simply and easily integrated into normal outreach and education activities. The toolkit has been developed over a number of years with input from professional outreach evaluators and from active outreach providers within the planetary science community. The toolkit includes a brief introduction to evaluation, a choice of 14 data collection tools, worked examples of data analysis techniques, case studies and tutorials.

  

  Anita Heward (Europlanet 2024 Research Infrastructure (RI))

  Coauthors: Jen DeWitt (Europlanet 2024 Research Infrastructure (RI), University of Kent, UK)

  For more information about this talk click here

• Assessing students in the 21st century

  Wednesday Oct. 13, 2021
  UTC: 6:50 a.m. - 7 a.m. America/New_York: 2:50 a.m.- 3 a.m.

  Thursday Oct. 14, 2021
  UTC: 7:20 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. America/New_York: 3:20 p.m.- 3:30 p.m.

  Innovation in education has been a very much debated theme around the world and teachers have been making huge efforts to update their teaching methods. From shifting the classroom into a more student-centered environment to the use of games for learning and the personalized and individualized approach to teaching, education is suffering a huge transformation. However, one question is often asked by teachers, which is: “How can I assess my students when I teach in innovative ways?”. When teachers shift their teaching methods and offer students a diverse and more personalized learning experience, the traditional standardized tests and exams become obsolete. If students encounter different learning opportunities inside the classroom and have the freedom to explore their own interests while learning fundamental life skills, it is natural to think that each student will acquire slightly different pieces of knowledge and retain different concepts at the same time. Therefore, a standardized assessment that focuses on such knowledge retention will not effectively portrait the real learning development of each student. Moreover, in an era where knowledge is easily accessed through a browser and a smartphone, it becomes imperative to shift the focus of student assessment. More than evaluating the ability to retain knowledge, it becomes important to focus both teaching and assessment in the development of fundamental skills like learning how to learn, critically thinking, innovation, divergent thinking, collaboration, communication, creativity, self-confidence, self-awareness, self-regulated learning, amongst others. Considering all the forementioned it is important to develop innovative ways of assessing students so that assessment itself becomes a powerful tool in the learning process. Tools like checklists, rubrics and automated global assessment tools are proposed.

  

  Priscila Doran (Nuclio/Coordinator of Erasmus+ project)

  For more information about this talk click here

• How did that happen? Mixed-method evaluation of astronomy resources.

  Wednesday Oct. 13, 2021
  UTC: 7 a.m. - 7:10 a.m. America/New_York: 3 a.m.- 3:10 a.m.

  Thursday Oct. 14, 2021
  UTC: 7:30 p.m. - 7:40 p.m. America/New_York: 3:30 p.m.- 3:40 p.m.

  Astronomy is a well-known effective point of engagement, sparking students’ curiosity and desire to learn. However, astronomy has a lot to offer; pretty pictures, a mind-blowing vastness, big telescopes, and application of much of the more mundane classroom science. As a result, it can be difficult to disentangle what specifically causes students' engagement. That is, what does an astronomy resource need in order to be effective and what other components are surplus to requirement? This presentation focuses on a PhD study involving 226 secondary school students that set out to answer this question. Focusing on both methodology and results, this presentation will explore how mixed-method evaluation can offer valuable information for developing and delivering effective astronomy resources.

  

  Sophie Bartlett (Cardiff University / Faulkes Telescope Project)

  For more information about this talk click here

• Discussion Panel: Evaluation

  Wednesday Oct. 13, 2021

  UTC: 7:10 a.m. - 7:30 a.m. America/New_York: 3:10 a.m.- 3:30 a.m.

  Thursday Oct. 14, 2021
  UTC: 7:40 p.m. - 8 p.m. America/New_York: 3:40 p.m.- 4 p.m.

  Chair:

  

  Silvia Casu

  Panel: Sophie Bartlett
  (Cardiff University), Sanlyn Buxner
  (Planetary Science Institute & University of Arizona), Priscila Doran
  (NUCLIO / Project Coordinator, Portugal), Amy Grack Nelson
  (CAISE), Anita Heward
  (Europlanet 2024 Research Infrastructure (RI))