Astronomy
I'm sorry that this is
all a bit unrefined at the moment: I'll try to tidy it up later.
Work
for Monday 25 January P6
I would like you to
have a go at writing up the Analysis and Evaluation sections of the Lunar
Eclipse project.
I STRONGLY suggest that you
write on one side of the paper only, and that you write on alternate
lines. This will enable you to insert alterations later without having to
write everything out again from scratch.
You have to do it by
yourself, but you are allowed to use calculators, your notes and your
textbook, so make sure you arrive with all of that stuff. I have arranged
for Mr Cordwell to provide a tray containing such things as compasses,
sellotape, etc. The teacher who supervises the lesson will give you a
plastic folder containing your observations and a piece of cardboard for
sticking the compass point into while you try out different radii. You
will find that the way I've sellotaped the two pieces of cardboard
together means that you can fold them one way but not the other. If you
want to stick your observation sheet down at one end, I suggest you put a
piece of sellotape on the back, and then apply a small amount of Pritt
stick adhesive to the sellotape - so you stick the sellotape to the
cardboard rather than the piece of paper. Then, when you come to remove
it, you will find that the observation sheet+sellotape will come away from
the cardboard, leaving your observation sheet undamaged (although now with
a piece of sellotape attached to the back of it!)
One crucial thing is
that you
are allowed to use the internet while
you
are working, which means that you can use this web site, together with the
various pages that you can access by clicking on the links above.
Another crucial
thing is that you don't have to finish
in one session. You will hand in what you have done to the
supervising teacher at the end. You will then be able to return to the
task at a later date, perhaps after we have had some more discussion in
class about ways of extracting the maximum number of marks from the
system.
So far as the links above are concerned,
- Eclipse
background tells you about the overall strategy
- Eclipse
analysis 1 tells you what to do if you have several diagrams
showing the shadow line
- Eclipse
analysis 2 tells you what to do if you have times and
clock-face positions of 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th contacts. (I'm afraid
this is quite demanding mathematically - but you are older now than
when we started and you might cope.)
- Astronomy
projects makes general remarks about getting high marks.
Inevitably, reading it will be hard going. If you manage to access
this page over the weekend, you are welcome to send me an email
telling me where you are finding it incomprehensible, and I will try
to get back to you. And, of course, you can ask your parents to help
you understand it. If you don't get to this page until Monday, then
just do your best: we can talk about it some more when we next meet.
It's a big hurdle to surmount, but once surmounted it will stay
surmounted!
Note that the first
three links mentioned are stored as PDF files rather HTML. This means that
you can click with the right-hand mouse button, which will allow you to
download them to your computer for printing out if you wish. It's worth
reading all three of them to pick up some astronomical vocabulary for use
in what you write.
Remember that you must paraphrase anything you use from this site: you are
allowed to get stuff off the internet, but it has to go through your brain
and be regurgitated in your own words. So read and inwardly digest before
you write.