Held in 2016 at the City College of San Francisco, The National Astronomy Teaching Summit brings together dedicated astronomy and planetary sciences educators to share innovative teaching techniques and successful instructional strategies that increase students' engagement, achievement, and motivation. Designed primarily for college professors teaching the introductory astronomy survey course-ASTRO 101-the summit proceedings includes information from formal presentations, interactive workshops, and round-table discussions all designed around astronomy teaching innovations. Astronomy educators...

Modern science teaching challenges students to engage in scientific research and participate in scientific discourse - in short, to do science themselves rather than just learn about it. Recent learning sciences research results demonstrate that in order for novice science students to effectively design, conduct, report, and defend science observations and experiments, learners must be purposefully supported in each step of the scientific process before they are able to successfully pursue scientific questions of their own design. Using a backwards faded scaffolding approach, these labs...

Designed for learning astronomy using collaborative learning groups, Mysteries of the Sky is the perfect book for teaching astronomy. The book is one-half traditional textbook and one-half learning activities. Each activity has been thoroughly field tested and requires about 35 minutes to complete. Start learning about astronomy right here using Mysteries of the Sky.

From a noted specialist in astronomy education and outreach, this Brief provides an overview of the most influential discipline-based science education research literature now guiding contemporary astronomy teaching. In recent years, systematic studies of effective and efficient teaching strategies have provided a solid foundation for enhancing college-level students' learning in astronomy. Teaching astronomy and planetary science at the college-level was once best characterized as professor-centered, information-download lectures. Today, astronomy faculty are striving to drastically improve...

The National Astronomy Teaching Summit is a professional conference bringing together dedicated astronomy and planetary sciences educators to share innovative teaching techniques and successful instructional strategies that increase students' engagement, achievement, and motivation. Traditionally focused on improving teaching and learning for the introductory college astronomy survey courses for non-science majoring undergraduates, the growing Summit event now brings together a wider variety of astronomy educators and outreach enthusiasts at all levels where astronomy and planetary science is...