Observation Exercises in Astronomy, 1st edition
Title overview
Observation Exercises in Astronomy is a lab manual containing a series of astronomy exercises that integrates technology from planetarium software such as SkyGazer, StarryNight Pro, Stellarium, and WorldWide Telescope. Each exercise is designed to engage the student in a different aspect of the scientific process.
- Students practice hypothesis forming, exploring models and their use in understanding the universe, updating models and refining hypotheses.
- In each exercise students are increasingly expected to fill in the gaps in scientific process.
- Each exercise includes an optional last step in which students produce work ranging from reflection papers to journal articles to lab reports for exercise in communicating like a scientist.
- Instructor Notes are included on the Instructor Resource Center (www.pearsonhighered.com/irc).
Table of contents
Instructional Introduction
1. Moon Phases and Scientific Models
2. Motions in the Night Sky and the Celestial Sphere
3. The Sun through the Seasons
4. Mars’ Motion and Models of the Solar System
5. How did Galileo go blind? Or, It’s the Data, Stupid!
6. What’s an Astronomical Unit?
7. How do we know the mass of Jupiter, anyway?
8. What Are Stars Made Of?
9. Inferring Physical Properties
10. Reading the Stars
11. What is the Milky Way Made Of?
12. Where in the Milky Way Are We?
13. How Close is Our Nearest Neighbor?
14. The Galaxy Zoo
15. Our Expanding Universe
Author bios
Observation Exercises in Astronomy is a lab manual containing a series of astronomy exercises that integrates technology from planetarium software such as SkyGazer, StarryNight Pro, Stellarium, and WorldWide Telescope. Each exercise is designed to engage you in a different aspect of the scientific process.