Máme rádi Slunce / I Love My Sun - Educational project for Czech primary schools. Results from 2014-2015

0461304 - ÚFA 2017 CZ eng A - Abstract
Humlová, D. - Mošna, Zbyšek - Urbář, Jaroslav - Macúšová, Eva
Máme rádi Slunce / I Love My Sun - Educational project for Czech primary schools. Results from 2014-2015.
Abstracts of Living Planet Symposium 2016. Praha: European Space Agency (ESA), 2016. s. 2018-open-25.
[ESA Living Planet Symposium 2016. 09.05.2016-13.05.2016, Praha]
Institutional support: RVO:68378289
Keywords : solar-terrestrial interactions * education
Subject RIV: DG - Athmosphere Sciences, Meteorology
http://lps16.esa.int/page_session51.php#2018p

In Autumn 2014 we visited a primary school in Tanvald (pop. 7,000) , Northern Bohemia, to start series of educational presentations for children in the age of approximately 7 to 11 years. The project was inspired by the work of (Tulunay et al., 2013, J. Space Weather Space Clim. 3, 2013). The goal of the project is to educate children about the topic connected to the Sun, Space Weather, and Sun-planets interactions. It covers the Solar system, discovery of sunspots, existence of solary cycles, CME, solar wind, magnetosphere, auroras, ISS and so on.
During the lesson children first draw/paint their idea of the Sun, then attend the presentation with discussion and eventually draw again the Sun. Up to now (October 2015) we visited 16 classes in several schools in Tanvald, Prague, Vlašim, and Železnice, and collected more than 250 pairs of pictures.
Our results show that the children were very interested in the topic and actively participated during the lessons. Typically, while first drawings depict usual chilren's ideas of the Sun (for example yellow Sun with face and radial rays or local landscape with the Sun and blue sky) the second picture reflects newly obtained motives as the magnetosphere protecting the Earth against disturbed Sun, auroras, dark space with planets and space vehicles. We believe that using this hands-on educational tool the children become acquainted with basic concepts of solar-terrestrial interactions and the importance of Space Weather for their generation.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0260926