See how astronomers, science communicators and teachers put astronomy in the daily lives of children and their families
CoAstro was featured in an online article for National Geographic Portugal, “Citizen astronomy: what scientific discovery have you made today?”
I wonder if you can find out the reason for this prominence of CoAstro in the article?
By the way: what is your personal response to the title of the article?
The CoAstro reproduction gave rise to “Pequenos Astrónomos [Little Astronomers]”. This new project emerged from the constant need to respond to the children curiosity in Dr. Carlos Pinto Ferreira School, who participated in the 1st CoAstro edition.
“Pequenos Astrónomos”, led by the CoAstrian teacher Maria Julieta Ferreira, intends to facilitate the teacher´s work with astronomy, in the classroom context, supported by astronomers from the Planetário do Porto – Centro Ciência Viva [Porto Planetarium – Ciência Viva Center].
This worthwhile initiative takes greater dimensions when it was considered as a project of the “Escola Amiga da Criança [Child Friendly School]”. This initiative aims to distinguish schools that conceive and concretize extraordinary ideas, contributing to a happier child development in the school and, mostly, share these good practices.
Congratulations to the CoAstrians and new Little Astronomers from Vila do Conde!
CoAstro was one of the few projects that had the privilege of being presented at the “Space Talks” promoted by the “Ecsite Space Group“.
The Space Group improves and extends communication about space science by helping science centres, space professionals and non-specialists to develop collaborative projects and events.
Ecsite’s vision is to foster creativity and critical thinking in European society, emboldening citizens to engage with science. Its mission is to inspire and empower science centres, museums and all organisations that engage people with science, and to promote their actions. The network gathers more than 350 organisations in Europe and world-wide.
CoAstro virtual presentation can be seen HERE. It echoes in the final report of the event available HERE.
On November 20 and 24, CoAstro was invited to participate in two classes: one from the Master degree in Science Teaching and Dissemination (at the Faculty of Sciences) and the other at the Training Course “Science Communication for Non-expert Audiences“ (at the Faculty of Engineering).
These classes were important moments to share and discuss, with students, the characteristics of citizen science and, in particular, the characteristics of CoAstro´s citizen science.
On July 2020, our “Condo Administrator” was tested with his thesis entitled “Citizen Science: public engagement in astronomy research and dissemination”. The mains members of the PhD Juri were Dr. João Manuel Fernandes and Dr. Pedro Russo. The Jury, chaired by Dr. António Porto, also included Dr. Paulo Simeão and Dra. Carla Morais (thesis supervisor).
After almost three hours of fruitful reflection on the work, the PhD degree, in Teaching and Dissemination of Sciences, was obtained.
July 2020 brought one more good news: CoAstro was validated as a citizen science project by SciStarter. This is one of the largest worldwide platforms dedicated to citizen science.
CoAstro can be seen on this platform HERE. However, for this, it had to be previously evaluated, in order to verify its relevance for citizen science.
The ESO (European Southern Observatory) Telescope captured the first ever image of a multi-planet system around a Sun-like star.
Such image originated a podcast, produced by CoAstrians from Porto Planetarium – Centro Ciência Viva. On the other hand, it enabled “our” João Faria to continue his career as a commentator: you can attest the clarity of his explanations HERE.
Over time CoAstro has been in several media news: