IP: UK students use research telescope in Hawaii over Internet

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> http://www.faulkes-telescope.com/
>
> Welcome to the Faulkes Telescope Project Website
>
>  The Faulkes Telescope Project will allow students in schools and colleges
> in the United Kingdom, Hawaii and Australia to make astronomical
> observations with research class telescopes, direct from the classroom via
> the Internet.
>
> The Starting Point - Young people world-wide are curious about their origins
> and excited by astronomy.  They can get information about astronomy from TV,
> books, newspapers, the Web and from active astronomers, both professional
> and amateur.
>
> But there’s no thrill like getting your own picture, the one you yourself
> have chosen, from a telescope -  now, this minute!
>
> It’s difficult to do this from a classroom, during the daytime.  True, some
> schools and colleges - even some students - have their own telescopes, but
> night-time observing sessions have their problems and will only ever be
> accessible to a minority of students.  And few individuals or schools can
> buy a telescope of a size and quality that even professional astronomers
> would be eager to use.
>
> The Project - The Faulkes Telescopes are two large astronomical telescopes
> to be located on the island of Maui, one of the Hawaiian chain in the middle
> of the Pacific, and in Australia. They will be operated remotely from
> control centres in the United Kingdom, Hawaii and Australia - no operator
> ‘on-the-mountain’ is needed. It is planned that the telescopes will be
> available to users in the United Kingdom during their daytime, due to the
> difference in longitude, and to local users in their evening or early
> morning.
>
> The Faulkes telescope will deliver observations of planets, stars and
> galaxies right into the school or college, as part of students' studies into
> how the Universe works.
>
> The Timescale - The first telescope (FT-North) is in an advanced stage of
> manufacture in Liverpool, UK, and will be fully operational on Hawaii by the
> end of 2001. The second telescope (FT-South) will be operational in
> Australia a year later.
>
> The Team - Partners in the Faulkes Telescope project include the Dill
> Faulkes Educational Trust, the University of Hawaii, the Australian National
> University, the Anglo-Australian Observatory, the Royal Observatory
> Greenwich, Liverpool John Moores University, the National Space Science
> Centre/University of Leicester and the Particle Physics and Astronomy
> Research Council.
>
> The Dill Faulkes Educational Trust is contributing the telescopes
> themselves.
>
>
> Overall Objectives
> The objectives of the Faulkes Telescope (FT) project are:
>
> -To provide schools with access to a research class telescope
>
> -To retain the interest of students in science to University level by
> providing an exciting resource for teachers to use via the Web
>
> -To allow students to see how science is actually carried out
>
> -To provide a real-time experience of astronomy, through live use of a
> telescope via the Web
>
> -To provide teaching materials keyed to UK National Curriculum requirements
>
> -To allow students to participate in real research programmes, mentored by
> professional astronomers
>
> -To support undergraduate teaching, when resources permit
>
> -To provide other public interest groups, such as amateurs, access to high
> quality astronomical data, again as resources permit
>
>
>
>
> Targets
> The (ambitious) target of the FT programme is to reach 500,000 school
> children and other users per year. Materials required for teachers and
> students to use the telescope will be developed, in association with the
> Royal Observatory Greenwich, Liverpool John Moores University and the
> National Space Science Centre.
>
> Liverpool John Moores University are already developing basic software for
> schools in the Merseyside area as part of the Liverpool Telescope Project,
> funded by PPARC and the EU. These materials will be further developed as
> part of a wider outreach programme in the rest of the UK.
>
> Potential for telescope use in schools
> The Liverpool Telescope Schools’ Programme has been running for more than
> three years and in that time has established that schools and colleges are
> excited with the prospect of using a professional astronomical telescope in
> the classroom. During this period it has also become very clear that robotic
> telescope technology offers schools a wide range of teaching opportunities
> covering many National Curriculum subjects at both primary and secondary
> level. Tertiary and Further Education establishments see many curriculum
> opportunities in support of traditional science teaching and the modern
> application of ICT, engineering and commerce.
>
> Close contact over the past three years with schools and colleges, and the
> curriculum development work currently underway to enable schools to use the
> Liverpool Telescope in the classroom, have identified the following
> potential teaching opportunities. The Faulkes Telescope will extend these
> opportunities, by providing its new real-time interface and also by
> additional off-line observation time outside school hours.
>
> Science
>  Practical investigations using a professional telescope (Key Stages 2/3/4
> and A-level physics courses).
>
>  Image analysis and data reduction (application of ICT in science).
>
>  International collaborative science projects (Cross curricular
> opportunities for Science, ICT, English and Geography).
>
>  Schools Science Clubs (Extending the curriculum ­ gifted child projects,
> Beacon schools, Technology Colleges).
>
>
> ICT
>  Practical application of communication technologies.
>
>  Image processing (application of ICT in the sciences).
>
>  Interrogating NSO and associated web sites.
>
>  Robotic control (robotic telescopes ideal examples of the application of
> control and IT).
>
>  Robotic telescopes as data loggers (difficult part of National Curriculum
> to find good teaching examples).
>
>  Key Skills (post 16).
>
>
> Mathematics
>  Practical application of mathematics within an interesting astronomical
> setting.
>
>
> Additional opportunities exist in the English, Design and Technology,
> Humanities, foreign language and special needs areas.
>
> Secondary Schools
> The FT will support the ‘Earth and Beyond’ section in the National
> Curriculum at Key Stages 3 and 4. An important development that access to
> professional telescopes will make is the opportunity for science departments
> to support an active science club. There is evidence that it will often be
> the school science club that stimulates access to telescope.
>
> A-level Physics classes will also want the opportunity to use a professional
> telescope and will often need to make multiple observations when monitoring
> objects. The analysis of the data develops generic skills of statistics,
> graphical display of data, hypothesis formation and project planning. The
> Institute of Physics considers the Faulkes and Liverpool Telescopes as
> outstanding resources that will significantly enhance the teaching of
> Physics.
>
> Robotic telescope are excellent examples of the application of ICT. Schools
> will readily incorporate their use into ICT lessons with students learning
> how Internet technology is used in an exciting way. Any resources that offer
> cross-curricular teaching opportunities are considered important,
> particularly with the National Curriculum demanding that all subject areas
> use ICT.
>
> Primary
> The primary sector is always looking to expand teaching opportunities.
> Access to a professional telescope in an exotic location will enable
> exciting education to take place. The National Curriculum does not require a
> rigorous treatment of the ‘Earth and Beyond’. However, the opportunity to
> explore the Solar System will present some exciting lessons.
> Cross-curricular project work bringing together Science, ICT, English,
> Geography and Design and Technology is certainly an exciting prospect for
> primary schools.
>
> The use of the FT in on-line mode (real-time) will offer excitement and the
> potential to stimulate many thousands of pupils. It will be challenging to
> incorporate on-line access to the FT within a school’s scheme of work and
> this needs some careful attention.
>
> Primary and Secondary Link Projects
> Many schools have expressed interest in using the telescopes as part of link
> projects, offering a common theme of study between the two phases, to ease
> pupils’ transfer between primary and secondary schools. These projects are
> common throughout the country and robotic telescopes offer an excellent
> platform on which to base such projects helping to maintain the momentum of
> pupils’ science education into the all-important period of adolescence.
>
> Other link projects
> Link projects between schools (and universities) are also possible, in
> coordinated observation programmes.  The linked schools could be in UK and
> Hawaii and spin out to other educational projects in geography, economics,…
>
> Field trips
> Real-time use of the FT constitutes a ‘cyber field trip’ to an exotic
> location for an exciting purpose at great convenience and at a very
> affordable price.  Of course, field trips to UK-based telescopes for ‘live’
> observing at night are problematic (safety issues, keeping children up at
> night, the UK’s poor weather statistics,…).  Field trips are featured in the
> national curriculum, with Web-based trips recognised as a variety of trip
> that will increase access by the disadvantaged (mobility restricted,
> economically disadvantaged, remotely based, deaf, …).   The FT is a route
> that will provide access by such groups to exciting science.
>
> Tertiary and Further Education
> The FT is aimed at use in primary and secondary schools where there is a
> strong need to keep students interested and engaged with science. However,
> there will be capacity (after school hours, weekends, out of school terms…)
> for some use at undergraduate and adult education levels where FT data will
> support research projects.  The amateur astronomy community are also obvious
> potential users, and the FT will develop their scientific capabilities.


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