Repost - Reflection on the Workshop

Ok so I was looking back through this blog to make sure everything was good and I realized that I misread the comments on the first blog.  I thought that answering the questions comment applied to future blog posts not the first one.  I’m pretty sure I was wrong about that so here is the redone reflection on the workshop blog .

1. Develop a concept map, which outlines the big ideas addressed in this webquest along with the fundamental concepts, which students should have as prior knowledge.

2. What SC standards (science, math, or otherwise) are related to the teachings/activities in the webquest?

There are no South Carolina state standards for high school astronomy but some high school physical science standards apply to this course.

PS-1.1 Generate hypotheses on the basis of credible, accurate, and relevant sources of scientific information.

PS-1.6 Evaluate the results of a controlled scientific investigation in terms of whether they refute or verify the hypothesis.

PS-1.9 Use appropriate safety procedures when conducting investigations.

PS-5.10 Explain how the gravitational force between two objects is affected by the mass of each object and the distance between them.

A large part of the weekend workshop was completing inquiry activities and figuring out the theory behind each activity.  I’ll hit those in more detail later.

3. Using your support documents for these standards, what is essential for students to understand?

The biggest thing that students should understand is that there is a lot more to the Moon than the fact that it’s a big whitish gray circle in the sky.  All the activities we did in the workshop should help them to get that.  One big concept that was covered in the workshop were the fact that the Moon’s main two surface features are the maria (dark spots) and highlands (light regions).  The other concept is that the interior of the Moon can tell us a great deal about the evolution of the Moon, Earth, and the rest of the solar system and that the craters on the Moon are vital in this. 

4. How can the materials/information be used to help students develop their essential understandings?  How can you modify the information or lesson to address the development of these understandings?

I would love to get a Moon beach ball and toss it to my students around the room like we did for the introductory activity in the workshop.  It was a good icebreaker activity but also each person told whether their right thumb landed on lunar maria (dark regions formed by ancient lava flows) or highlands (pretty much anything that is not maria).  The responses were recorded and around one-fifth of the responses were on maria.  Turns out that this was very close to the around 16% of the surface covered by maria.  The following pictures show the near and far side of the Moon and the fact that the highlands cover the majority of the lunar surface. 

Another activity we did was making craters in flour.  We dropped different size marbles into white flour that had a layer of dark cinnamon on top.  These impacts made craters that varied according to projectile size, mass, and angle of impact.  The impacts caused the white flour underneath to be ejected from the crater causing rays in some instances just like the familiar monster crater Tycho on the southern hemisphere of the near side of the Moon.  It showed how objects that impact the Moon can expose the subsurface material.

This activity made a mess (especially when I used the slingshot) but it has so many applications in terms of how craters form, using impacts to gather data on subsurface composition, estimating meteorite size and composition from the crater, estimating age of the surface by looking at number of craters per area, etc.  I think my students would have a great time with it. 

5. What key misconceptions commonly inhibit a clear and accurate understanding of this content?  How should you modify your instruction to address these misconceptions?

A big misconception that students will probably have is that the Moon’s surface is covered roughly evenly by maria and highlands.  This misconception would arise from the fact that when we look at the Moon at night, we only see the near side which has a 50/50 maria/highlands distribution but it is easy to forget that there is a far side of the Moon that we never see from Earth.  The pictures above show that the far side is predominantly highlands. 

The picture of the Moon below is taken from the side.  I remember when I first saw it, I initially thought it was Mercury. 

Basically, any picture of the Moon that is not the near side as we see it looks does not look like the Moon.  It’s something that I’m sure can confuse students as well.  I would probably show this picture well after we cover Earth and are covering Jupiter or Saturn since both of those have heavily cratered moons.  I bet most of the students would think it would be something other than the Moon.

6. What new scientific information did you learn in this lesson?

The main thing I learned in the workshop was that the vast majority of the Moon is highlands.  I have seen pictures of the far side of the Moon before but I never put it together that the dark maria we see on the near side cover much less than half of the surface. 

Also, I have long believed that a blue moon was the second full moon in a month when in fact it is the fourth full moon in one season.  The original misconception was due to an error in an almanac or newspaper back in the 1950s I believe. 

7. What questions do you still have?  (Write at least two and answer them with the resources and links provided.)

I really didn’t have any questions after the workshop.  I felt that I knew more coming in than most other participants in the workshop and I even won a prize for answering the most questions correctly on a pretest.  This is probably due to the fact that astronomy has been a hobby for a long time for me.  I read books, look at websites, and take out my telescope often on clear nights.  Most of the other participants were elementary and middle school teachers so they did not need to know as much about the Moon as I do for my astronomy class. 

8. What new instructional practice did you learn?  Describe how you can use this in the classroom.

The flour crater activity and lunar beach ball activity are the two practices that I will definitely use this coming year in astronomy.  In fact, I’m thinking very seriously about doing the lunar beach ball activity on the first day of school so I can get to know my students.  I think it would be better than the standard form I have my students fill out every year. 

Google Moon is one of the best tools that I have learned in any class.  We will be using it a ton along with Google Mars.