Activities in the Classroom

Problems: space, time, materials

Solutions: sit in aisle, take the time, use simple materials

Examples from AASTRA

• color filters and diffraction gratings

• using lenses

• phases of the moon

• Moons of Jupiter

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Although some of the activities from AASTRA were designed for much younger students than college level, some of the materials are easily adapted for college level.

For example, although most astronomy classes use diffraction gratings to explore spectra, few also use color filters to explore the light and color in astronomy. The application is to make color images from three exposures with a CCD camera.

'More than Magnifiers' from Lawrence Hall of Science provides an inexpensive and easy way to allow students to experience focal length without a laboratory setting.

'Moons of Jupiter', also from LHS, can give an entire class Galileo's data on Jupiter, with the results plotted on an overhead projector.