For my Capstone project, I will be developing an informal virtual camp for families in conjunction with Science Friday and the NASA Heliophysics Education Activation Team (NASA HEAT). The camp will feature both synchronous and asynchronous elements throughout the months of October and November centered around the science of the sun. The target age of students will be grades K-3, but at-home activities will be scaffolded for older children in the family to enjoy. A version of the curriculum will also be provided to libraries, schools, and community groups for use in their spaces to broaden participation. Materials will be provided to participants. Assessment will focus on capturing demographic information, a satisfaction survey, and the creation and documentation of activity artifacts. The program will be free to participants.
The mission of Helio Camp is to develop open educational resources drawing on the latest heliophysics research. The goal is to facilitate free interactions with families around the heliophysics theme in partnership with their communities to increase awareness and understanding of the scope of sun-related science in advance of the 2023 solar eclipse. The program will seek to recruit families from underserved communities and engage them in a variety of activities provided by subject matter experts, educational facilitators, and scientists working in the field.
The program will focus on hands-on learning through projects, games, and crowd science activities centered around three essential questions:
What drives the constant change we observe on our sun?
What drives the changes in near-Earth space, the planetary space environments, the heliosphere, and the interstellar medium?
What are the impacts of this dynamic space system on humanity?
There will be 4-6 weeks of online synchronous sessions delivered by facilitators to families that feature either a design project or scientific experiment using provided materials. There will also be weekly asynchronous activities that families can use to extend the learning each week. In addition, there will be the opportunity to engage virtually with astronomers, planetary scientists, artists, and makers related to heliophysics through a Kick-Off event featuring our panel of experts and at least one Q&A event featuring a prominent heliophysics scientist. Weekend blended crowd science challenges will focus on getting families out into their community to explore science with other stakeholders and community groups. A project guide (available in English and Spanish) will be created for families and community groups and distributed for free online. This guide will be combined with bulk materials and sent in advance of the program to registered libraries, schools, and other groups in underserved areas to facilitate their ability to host the activities on a schedule that makes sense for their audience.
For assessment, our focus will be on the participant's ability to demonstrate confidence and understanding of the topics covered in the program. Participants will be asked to complete a short exit ticket after each synchronous session. They’ll be encouraged to create artifacts in a simple notebook and share them each week. Participants will also be encouraged to share photos of their projects on social media and will have the ability to submit media through an online form to be featured on the Helio Camp webpage. Libraries, schools, and community groups will be asked to complete a survey about their experience as facilitators.
My role will be to design the overall program, select the content to be included, design a framework for camp sessions, select and contract subject matter experts and facilitators, train our facilitators as well as facilitators at libraries, schools, and other community locations, recruit participants for Helio Camp (after identifying underserved areas to target and invite), plan, procure and ship kit materials, design the activities guide, work with partners to promote the program, design assessment tools, aid in the collection of data related to the program and effectively communicate the results to our grant funders.