Robotic Telescopes and Student Research in the School Curriculum around the OECD countries

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to explore the presence and possible incorporation of inquiry-based learning approaches using Robotic Telescopes and Student Research in the regular science curriculum. This study uses preliminary findings from an extensive ongoing study, which is currently reviewing the extent of astronomy content in the school curriculum of the 35 member countries from the OECD in addition to two emerging nations in modern astronomy -China and South Africa, which are not part of the OECD. Analysis of curriculum documents from 28 OECD countries, including China and South Africa, reveals that although there is a prevalence of astronomy related content in most grades, incorporating Robotic Telescopes and Student Research into the regular science curriculum is limited by two interdependent factors. Firstly, the majority of curricula introduce astronomy-related concepts through a descriptive lens, with a focus on the "what?", rather than the "how?" or "why?". Secondly, astronomy in comparison to other topics gets very little time allocation. Robotic Telescopes provide teachers with enormous potential to teach students not only topics related to science, but also to afford students the opportunity to engage in "authentic science". Thus, it is vital for the members of the astronomy community to play a greater role in the development of curricula.

Secondary School Students observe Venus with NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF)

“…In light of the global push to get students engaged in science and technology, many aspects of astronomy have become popular and introduced in school curricula for decades (Lelliott & Rollnick 2010), leveraging the many examples in astrophysics with direct links to Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics and even Biology (Salimpour In this context, there has been an significant growth in the number robotic telescopes with observing time fully or partially devoted to educational purposes and friendly user interface to ease the remote control by school students (Gomez & Fitzgerald 2017). This has allowed school teachers to easily implement inquiry-based learning approaches and students to have authentic science experiences, start international collaborations and even make discoveries and publish the results (Salimpour et al 2018;Fitzgerald et al 2018).…”

Capturing the Cosmos: Teaching Astronomy (and more) through Astrophotography in Middle School

“…Over the past couple of decades, there has been a dramatic increase in Robotic and Remote telescopes, owing to the rapid progress and feasibility of technology (Gomez and Fitzgerald, 2017). However, despite this, the reviews by Salimpour et al (2018a), show that within the school curricula, the use of Robotic/Remote telescopes (RRTs) is not explicit. The onus is on teachers to incorporate this into their lessons, given that most curricula afford the flexibility to incorporate lessons which make use of Robotic telescopes (RTs).…”