Employing Bohr's quantum theory, the author deduces three limits, which correspond to the magnetic fields of white dwarfs, neutron stars and the strongest in the universe. The author discusses the possible origins of magnetic fields due to collapse of stars, which produces a magnetic field of 10[superscript 8] T. Although the complete analysis…

Although concept inventories are among the most frequently used tools in the physics and astronomy education communities, they are rarely evaluated using item response theory (IRT). When IRT models fit the data, they offer sample-independent estimates of item and person parameters. IRT may also provide a way to measure students' learning gains…

We created a series of videos for an online introductory astronomy course at the Pennsylvania State University in part to address the lack of personal presence in online courses. Based on surveys administered to the students during the semester, we found that these videos were effective in creating an instructor presence within the online course.…

The recent missions to Mars have produced a mass of data and information in all forms and have forced the minds of many people world-wide to rethink their own perspectives on life itself. This drama unfolding about 35 million miles from Earth, and digitally on our TV screens, is offering a growing reservoir for teachable moments. The curiosity and…

In the first months of 2009, the International Year of Astronomy, the authors developed an educational project for middle-level students connected with the first astronomical discoveries that Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) made 400 years ago. The project included the construction of a basic telescope and the observation of the Moon. The project, if…

In 2009, we had the year of astronomy. Even President Obama hosted an astronomy night on the White House lawn. Your explorations of nature need not be limited to daylight hours--though it is important to point our when celestial objects like the Moon are visible during the day to counter misconceptions. This year, introduce your students to the…

Visual assessments and tutorials are instruments that rely on student construction and/or examination of pictures and/or diagrams rather than multiple choice and/or short answer questions. Being a very visual subject, astronomy lends itself to assessments and tutorials of this type. What follows is a report on the results of the use of visual…

In the present study, we test the effectiveness of a teaching intervention aiming at acquainting children aged four to six years with the concept of the sphericity of the earth and the causes of the phenomenon of day and night. The treatment comprised three units of activities that were developed collaboratively by a researcher and early years…

Multimedia technologies such as Slowmation can be used to enhance curriculum resources and support innovative teaching methods. This case study research of a rural multi-aged class of primary science students included analyses of classroom captured video and interview data from a term long module on Astronomy. The study explored how students'…

The Pulsar Search Collaboratory (PSC) (NSF #0737641) is a joint project between the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and West Virginia University designed to interest high school students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics related career paths by helping them to conduct authentic scientific research. The 3 year PSC program,…

This article describes how the author carries out an investigation into the geometry of the three possible curvatures of the universe. The author begins the investigation by looking on the web and in books. She found that the general consensus was that there were three different possible curvatures of the universe, namely: (1) flat; (2) positive;…

The main purpose of the stellar demonstrator is to help explain the movement of stars. In particular, students have difficulties understanding why, if they are living in the Northern Hemisphere, they may observe starts in the Southern Hemisphere, or why circumpolar stars are not the same in different parts of Europe. Using the demonstrator, these…

The wave nature of light is not part of students' common experiences, so often physics teachers and textbooks will add a historical anecdote about how scientists, too, were tricked by light. A common one is how, in the early 19th century, Poisson declared that since Fresnel's ideas on the wave nature of light implied that the shadow cast by a disk…

The International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009) was conceived to honor the 400th anniversary of the first use of an astronomical telescope by Galileo Galilei in 1609, and has evolved into an engaging series of worldwide programs. IYA2009 is sponsored by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and endorsed by the U.S. House of…

This dissertation is a linguistic ethnography of a high school Astronomy/Oceanography classroom in southern Arizona, where an exceptionally promising, novice, white science teacher and mostly Mexican-American students confronted issues of identity and difference through interactions both related and unrelated to science learning. Through close…