Speaker
Description
Digital simulations are central to modern astronomy education, yet many tools used in undergraduate laboratories no longer meet contemporary pedagogical or technical standards. We present two newly developed, bespoke simulation environments designed to support foundational astronomy practicals: the Hertzsprung–Russell (HR) diagram activity and the Hubble–Redshift distance relation investigation.
The simulations have been engineered as lightweight, browser‑based HTML applications, ensuring high accessibility across operating systems, seamless deployment in teaching laboratories, and ease of use for students working on personal devices. Their modern interfaces allow learners to manipulate real astronomical data, visualise relationships in real time, and engage more deeply with the logic of observational inference. Built‑in scaffolding supports both structured learning and open‑ended exploration, strengthening conceptual understanding of stellar evolution and cosmological expansion.
Pilot deployment with teaching staff demonstrated substantial improvements in usability, reliability, and student engagement. Early evaluation indicates that the redesigned tools enhance students’ ability to interpret observational data and connect empirical evidence to astrophysical models.
To support broader adoption and community‑driven improvement, the simulations are being released as openly available resources for use by other educational providers. This talk will outline the design principles, implementation pathway, and evaluation outcomes of the new tools, and will discuss how accessible, discipline‑specific digital resources can strengthen inquiry‑based learning in astronomy at scale.
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