Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Participants
- Welcome and Opening Address
- Astronomy Education: an International Perspective
- Special Lecture: Sundials in London – Linking architecture and astronomy
- 1 University Education
- 2 Distance Learning and Electronic Media in Teaching Astronomy
- 3 The Student Learning Process
- 4 Planetarium Education and Training
- 5 Public Education in Astronomy
- 6 Teaching Astronomy in the Schools
- Current Trends in European Astronomy Education
- Project ASTRO: a successful model for astronomer/teacher partnerships
- The Training of Teachers
- New Trends in Astronomy Teaching
- Coping with a New Curriculum: the evolving schools program at the Carter Observatory, New Zealand
- US Science Education Reforms: is astronomy being overlooked?
- “Plaza del Cielo” Complex: its state of evolution
- Astronomy as a School Subject
- Teaching Astronomy at Secondary School Level in Europe
- A High School Course for a wide Range of Student Abilities
- Measuring the Eccentricity of the Terrestrial Orbit: an experiment in the classroom
- A Program incorporating Physics, Astronomy and Environment
- Classroom Activity: Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion
- Collaboration as a Viable Approach for Making Astrophysics Research accessible to the K-12 Community through the Internet and the World Wide Web
- Astronomy Teaching in the Astronautics Club
- The TRUMP Astrophysics Project: Resources for Physics Teaching
- The Life in the Universe Series
- The Astronomy Village: investigating the Universe
- Posters
- Final Address
- Authors
“Plaza del Cielo” Complex: its state of evolution
from 6 - Teaching Astronomy in the Schools
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 June 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Participants
- Welcome and Opening Address
- Astronomy Education: an International Perspective
- Special Lecture: Sundials in London – Linking architecture and astronomy
- 1 University Education
- 2 Distance Learning and Electronic Media in Teaching Astronomy
- 3 The Student Learning Process
- 4 Planetarium Education and Training
- 5 Public Education in Astronomy
- 6 Teaching Astronomy in the Schools
- Current Trends in European Astronomy Education
- Project ASTRO: a successful model for astronomer/teacher partnerships
- The Training of Teachers
- New Trends in Astronomy Teaching
- Coping with a New Curriculum: the evolving schools program at the Carter Observatory, New Zealand
- US Science Education Reforms: is astronomy being overlooked?
- “Plaza del Cielo” Complex: its state of evolution
- Astronomy as a School Subject
- Teaching Astronomy at Secondary School Level in Europe
- A High School Course for a wide Range of Student Abilities
- Measuring the Eccentricity of the Terrestrial Orbit: an experiment in the classroom
- A Program incorporating Physics, Astronomy and Environment
- Classroom Activity: Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion
- Collaboration as a Viable Approach for Making Astrophysics Research accessible to the K-12 Community through the Internet and the World Wide Web
- Astronomy Teaching in the Astronautics Club
- The TRUMP Astrophysics Project: Resources for Physics Teaching
- The Life in the Universe Series
- The Astronomy Village: investigating the Universe
- Posters
- Final Address
- Authors
Summary
Our motivations for the creation of “Plaza del Ciel”
We consider that one of the most important aspects in the harmonic development of a person is his relationship with the natural environment in which he lives: in that environment he initially trains and enlarges his curiosity and the capacity for astonishment, both innate properties of human beings. It is so much so that we could locate the germ of all creative future activities, scientific or otherwise, in what happens with those characteristics during the years of childhood, that if fully developed will help children to become sensitive and critical adults. So we consider it necessary to generate the mechanisms to reinforce the sensibility, the critical observation and the interaction with natural phenomena, in a systematic way, as we propose in “Plaza del Cielo”.
Education by means of Astronomy is the principal nucleus of our proposal. This is so especially because we consider that those aspects of Nature studied by Astronomy and the way this science works is a powerful tool to motivate children and adults, that it is one of the best ways to study Nature, and that it brings us as educators new means to show the evolution and full integration among the many ways, not only scientific, Humanity has constructed throughout History in order to comprehend not only the Universe, but ourselves as well.
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- New Trends in Astronomy Teaching , pp. 277 - 282Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1998