Space Grant Consortium - University of Wisconsin - Green Bay

Abstract
Background
Teaching the Teachers
An Outreach Program of Crossroads at Big Creek
Coggin Heeringa
Crossroads at Big Creek Environmental Learning Preserve
Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin
In the project, Teaching the Teachers, Crossroads at Big Creek offered stipends
to teachers who participated in classes and workshops pertaining to spacerelated
science.
The project was based on the belief that when elementary school teachers
develop confidence and content knowledge of astronomy by participating in
experience-based activities. This increases the quantity and quality of spacerelated
instruction at the elementary level.
The target audience included elementary teachers who had little or no
experience or prior interest in astronomy because these people are in the position
to either inspire or inhibit learning of young people.
Even astronomers have difficulty comprehending and explaining the wonders of
the universe. If professionals find the abstract concepts of astronomy mindboggling,
elementary school teachers are understandably daunted at the task of
introducing this material to their young students. Many teachers, lacking content
knowledge, dread their astronomy units. Others grasp the continuously evolving
concepts, but have difficulty developing age-appropriate lessons.
As a part of a previous WSGC grant, Crossroads at Big Creek, collaborating
with the Door Peninsula Astronomical Society, developed a one graduate credit
class which now has been offered five times through the Office of Outreach and
Extension, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. Those who have taken the class
have been enthusiastic and have infused the space-related material into the
curriculum.
Alas, in offering these classes, we were “preaching to the choir.” The teachers
who enrolled in our astronomy classes were the individuals who already
exhibited a strong interest in science.
This project was made possible with a grant from the Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium.
11