Ellen Geerts: Space education: the final frontier? Scientix European Conference, 6-8 May 2011, Brussels

1. SPACE EDUCATION:
the final frontier?
Scientix Conference
Brussels
6 - 8 May 2011

2. Education at ESA
• Lisbon strategy report (2000) -> attract more
students towards a career in STEM
• ESA Education Office addresses Europe’s need
to build an increasingly knowledge-based
society
• How ?
 By drawing upon the genuine fascination
for spaceflight young people possess, in
order to motivate them to pursue STEM

3. Education at ESA
• foundation of the European Space Education
Resource Office (ESERO) project

two main objectives:
- to enhance literacy in science and technology
using space-related themes and resources
- to encourage career pursuits in STEM fields,
and in the space domain in particular

4. ESERO: genesis of the project
• reaching the primary target audience directly
is an impossible task for ESA
• the languages and educational systems are
very different from one Member State to
another
• ESA’s approach:
- Member State by Member State
- user-driven with the focus on teachers

5. ESERO: aims and objectives
• establish ESERO contact points in all ESA
Member States
• support the specific educational needs of the
Member States and their education
communities
• get easy access to already existing national
education networks in science & technology

6. ESERO Belgium
• Pilot phase:
- research formal and informal educational
environment in Belgium
- foundation for the production and dissemination of
new space-related educational material
- launch of the Space Schools program

7. Space and astronomy in formal education:
findings of the preparatory study
• Need for ready-to-use space-related
educational material
• Limited science training -> lack of confidence
to tackle the theme “space” in class
• Need for specialized teacher trainings
• No access to laboratories for experimentation
• Time to devote to a project is limited
• Limited budgets

8. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- Launch of the Space schools program:
schools can apply to receive the status and privileges of being
a “Space School” by sending in STEM-related project
proposals

9. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- Development and dissemination of educational
material and didactic manuals

10. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- Organizing formal teacher trainings

11. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- Space workshop for teacher trainees
Why target teacher education studies?
-> in the formal teacher trainings only teachers with an
already keen interest in space enrolled
-> in teacher education studies the space workshop is
part of the curriculum (= mandatory)
-> teacher trainees are our FUTURE teachers!

12. ESERO Belgium
Space workshop for teacher trainees - photos

13. ESERO Belgium
Space workshop for teacher trainees - photos

14. Space education in primary school
• Don’t be afraid of the clever questions
children will ask -> explore together!
• Hands-on experiences
• Small budget + creativity = awesome
experiments/projects

15. Let’s put it into practice
Quiz time!
“Who am I ?”

16. Who am I ?
I am a planet and …
- I have two moons
- starting from the Sun, I am the first planet after the
Earth
- I am also called “the red planet”
- a lot of people think there is life on me
- my name originates from the Roman god of war
- you can also eat me

17. Mars

18. Who am I ?
I am a planet and …
- I have a ring but I am not Saturn
- to the ancient Romans I am the God of the Skies,
Lightning and Thunder
- I have a great red spot which is a huge, long-lasting
storm in my atmosphere
- I am a gas giant and I have 61 moons
- On one of my moons you can find active vulcanoes
- I am the biggest planet in our Solar system

19. Jupiter

20. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- ESERO scientific educational events
“A day in the life of an astronaut” – october 2009

21. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- ESERO scientific educational projects
“Aim high!” project – 2010-2011

22. ESERO Belgium
First operational phase:
- Participation in scientific educational events
Greenlight for Girls science day – Brussels nov 2010

23. Links
• http://www.esa.int/education
• http://www.esa.int/kids
• http://www.esa.int/esero

24. Questions ?

25. European Space Education Research Office
An education project of the European Space Agency
Ellen Geerts
Projectmanager
ESERO Belgium
esero@planetarium.be
www.esa.int/esero