Under Canadian Skies…

1. Under Canadian Skies… A Canadian open-source online course in introductory astronomy Martin ConnorsAthabasca University Brian MartinThe King’s University College

2. Canadian Astronomy – an un-told story? Since the time of the Plaskett telescope Canadian astronomers have been at the forefront of astronomical research. Despite this Canadian students would gain little or no insight into this rich history by scanning the pages of most popular astronomy texts!

3. Where and when did the first successful application of VLBI occur? • Who is credited with discovering the first black hole? • What does the acronym MOST stand for? • Who was the first person to detect interstellar matter (CN and CH compounds) and estimate the temperature of the universe? • Where and when where neutrino oscillations first observed? • What is the fastest known pulsar and who is credited with its discovery? • This Canadian site which predates Stonehenge may have been a Palaeolithic “observatory” – where is it? • Which team is credited with the first discovery of an extra-galactic black hole? • First identification of water in comets is credited to this Nobel Laureate – who is this? • Who wrote the popular guide The Stars Belong to Everyone?

4. Not “Blatant Nationalism” - overt attention to authentic and appropriate Canadian content is pedagogically sound

5. The project… • Develop a web deliverable intro course covering the usual topics • Currently 80% completion on 1st draft • September piloting at King’s, late 2010 pilot at AU • Highly interactive through use of Flash (ActionScript 3) and JAVA applets • Roughly 100 interactive applets covering all topics • Most applets are Flash based to enable easy transport across platforms

6. The project… • Support for open source software such as Stellarium and Celestia • PC/MAC/Linux compatible • “Scalable” from non-science track to BSc track • To be used as stand-alone resource or to augment existing texts • Can be modularized to accommodate different curricula • Adaptable to active-learning pedagogy as well as more traditional delivery modes

7. A sample page… • Chapters divided into “lecture size” chunks • Each section contains a number of worked examples • Right-hand side margin (not shown) contains marginalia, quick tips etc • Sections end with practice problems • Units end with on-line practice quizzes

8. Exemplars… • The applet is part of a suite of applets dealing with line profiles and line formation including: • Temperature, pressure and rotation effects • Applets encourage “what if …” questioning scenarios

9. Exemplars… • From Chapter 7.1 – The Solar Atmosphere • Random walk from solar core • Non-radial modes • Applets are embedded in text and form part of the “story” in an interactive way

10. Exemplars… • From Chapter 12.1 – Discovery of the Galaxy • Applet that demonstrates different aspects of variable stars

11. Exemplars… • Doppler Shifts versus Cosmological redshift Well known misconceptions are dealt with – here confusion between Doppler shift and cosmological redshift

12. Other Applets… An powerful interactive graphing tool is used in many applets – here is one dealing with distance moduli. Stellar parallax is illustrated with this applet

13. Other Applets… Applet is linked to a collection of stellar models an allows investigation (by shell) of key model parameters Just a small sample of applets being developed for this course

14. What’s next? • Materials presented here would serve as a useful study guide but… • Transition to a “stand-alone” e-text requires more work: • More detailed narrative • Elaboration of practice problem sets, quizzes and on-line evaluation tools • Editing of existing text and applets

15. What’s next? • Can CASCA-Education become involved? • Facilitate creation of editorial board and authoring team • Open source project with nominal licensing fee to universities and colleges • Revenues would support employment of summer students etc in resource development/maintenance

16. Answer key…. • Where and when did the first successful application of VLBI occur? DRAO and Algonquin Park in 1968. • Who is credited with discovering the first black hole? Tom Bolton 1972 DDO • What does the acronym MOST stand for? Microvariability and Oscillation of STars • Who was the first person to detect interstellar matter (CN and CH compounds) and estimate the temperature of the universe? Andrew McKellar - 1940 • Where and when where neutrino oscillations first observed? SNO - 1999 • What is the fastest known pulsar and who is credited with its discovery? PSR J1748-2446ad discovered by Jason Hessels of McGill University • This Canadian site which predates Stonehenge may have been a Palaeolithic “observatory” – where is it? Majorville medicine wheel, Alberta • Which team is credited with the first discovery of an extra-galactic black hole? Hutchings, Cowley and Crampton – 1983. • First identification of water in comets is credited to this Nobel Laureate – who is this? Gerhard Herzberg • Who wrote the popular guide The Stars Belong to Everyone? Helen Sawyer Hogg

17. Questions? • Working site at which course can be previewed:http://www.kcvs.ca/martin/astro/au/ • This is a pre-release version (not edited – etc) but provides “proof-in-concept”