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WP 5 - SA3 service activities for higher education and outreach EuroVO-AIDA – Final review – 5 October 2010

WP5-SA3 Service activities for higher education and outreach

Massimo Ramella and Riccardo Smareglia (INAF)

Massimo Ramella, WPTL


WP5 Objectives


• Provide tools for access to VO data for higher education students, for middle school teachers and students, and for amateur astronomers

• Provide some basic information on the main classes of objects available to our public within the Euro VO database

• Contact various international projects for the diffusion of astronomy in order to merge (part of) their knowledge base with our outreach interfaces


Deliverable D5.3 (April 2010)


1. Aladin Version 6.0552. Stellarium Version 0.10.43. SimPlay4. Use Cases with information on astronomical objects: 4.1 - The sky 4.2 - The stars 4.3 - The shape of galaxies 4.4 - The Pleiades open cluster 4.5 - Proper motion of the Barnard’s star 4.6 - Confirmation of an apparent supernova 4.7 - Distance of the Andromeda galaxy 4.8 - Distance of the Crab nebula 4.9 - Asteroids in the Solar System 4.10 - Planetary conjunctions5. Website (AIDA WP5) dedicated to the distribution of our products to the public: http://wwwas.oats.inaf.it/aidawp5/


VO-days


• 11 Sessions + 1 Videoconf with TNG• All cities with INAF structures• 6 tutors for each session (a team of 10 people involved)

288 registered, 242 attended, 181 filled our evaluation form


VO-days


First Day:

09:30 - 09:35: Introduction ( R. Smareglia )

09:35 - 09:50: The Virtual Observatory: an Overview ( R.Smareglia )

09:50 - 10:15: A Virtual Tour of the Virtual Observatory ( P. Manzato)

10:15 - 11:50 Use Case 1: Confirmation of a Supernova candidate ( G. Iafrate )

11:50 - 13:00 Use Case 2: Searching for Data available for the bright galaxy M51 ( M. Molinaro )

13:00 - 14:00 Lunch

14:00 - 15:00 Use Case 2 : (continue)

15:00 - 17:00 Use Case 3: Photometric redshifts with DaME ( O. Laurino )

17:00 - 19:00 AIDA WP5 outreach dissemination. ( G. Iafrate )

Second Day):

09:30 - 11:30 Use Case 4: Data Extraction from Multidimensional Dataset ( A. Costa)

11:30 - 12:00 Discussion / Feedback


Latest developments (post D5.3)


• 2 new use cases:• motion of planets and Kepler’s laws• the sky for very young kids

• More translations of use cases

• Website fully translated into german


Latest developments (post D5.3)


Efforts to bring astronomy in classrooms with AIDA/WP5 and to advertise our products in progress!

• France: workshop for teachers “La main a la pate” coming soon

• Germany: “Tagung der Astronomischen Gesellschaft” in Bonn: AIDAWP5 at the session on e-Learning (September, 13-17)

• Italy: INAF promotes AIDA/WP5 to nation-wide resource for teachers (4 major institutes/towns already active for the schoolyear 2010-2011)


European Researchers’ Night 2010


September 24: Yet another occasion to spread AIDA/WP5!

Our “first generation” of AIDA/WP5 users introduces the VO concept and WP5 tools to classes of kids their age in Trieste.

Sunset at the North Pole

15Touch game: classify galaxies!


Conclusion


A winning strategy at the base of the success of WP5

• Choice of tools (Aladin and Stellarium)• Combination of Use Cases and software/data• Translation of tools and Use Cases in several languages• Development of products in contact with test users• Sustainability of resources

Together with productive interactions among memebrs of a team both technically excellent and with a heartwarming human side.


Conclusion


Furthermore

• Contacts in person, presentations, and support essential for the establishment of primary points of diffusion

• Diffusion significantly enhanced by word-of-mouth process

AIDA/WP5 a great resource for schools and public, hopefully still just a seed that will grow with a larger variety of topics/disciplines