ASTRONOMY EDUCATION RESEARCH: EFFORTS TOWARDS TEACHING FOR DIVERSITY AND INCLUSIVITY IN SOUTH AFRICA

Abstract

Many students are attracted to astronomy due to its inviting nature of spectacular wonders. However, studying astronomy goes beyond these wonders, which poses a challenge to students' knowledge and understanding of basic astronomical phenomena. The University of Cape Town has developed a series of research studies that probe the nature of student difficulties at a fine-grained level, in particular looking into how students conceive of astronomical distances which are beyond immediate human comprehension. The key experimental findings from this study were that as distances increased different modes of thinking were employed to make sense of them. The experimental findings could be explained by the embodied cognition framework which posits that the way we think (all thought) is ultimately grounded in infant sensory-motor experiences. In this case, the thinking template or image schema was suggested to be the "source-path-goal". Having identified the "thinking" framework allows for a research-based construction of learning activities that lead to sense-making. Thus, the notion of the Source-Path-Goal Thinking Template / Image Schema was used to create an activity that would trigger this mode of thinking for large-scale distances. Based on the current experimental findings that can be explained by an "embodied cognition" framework, learning activities were piloted that appear to have had a measure of success.