A New Resource for College Distance Education Astronomy Laboratory Exercises

TL;DR

This paper presents a comprehensive set of online astronomy lab exercises designed for college distance education, combining hands-on and computer-based activities, with initial results showing effective student learning outcomes.

Contribution

It introduces a novel, integrated online resource suite for astronomy labs tailored for distance education, including diverse activities and analysis tools.

Findings

Distance learners perform as well or better than on-campus students.

The resource suite effectively supports core astronomy content and mathematical applications.

Initial usage results are promising for remote astronomy education.

Abstract

This article introduces a set of distance education astronomy laboratory exercises for use by college students and instructors and discuss first usage results. This General Astronomy Education Source (GEAS) exercise set contains eight two-week projects designed to guide students through both core content and mathematical applications of general astronomy material. Projects are divided between hands-on activities and computer-aided analyses of modern astronomical data. The suite of online resources includes student and instructor guides, laboratory report templates, learning objectives, video tutorials, plotting tools, and web-based applications that allow students to analyze both images and spectra of astronomical objects. A pilot usage study indicates that distance learners using these materials perform as well or better than a comparison cohort of on-campus students. We are actively seeking collaborators to use these resources in astronomy courses and other educational venues.