Lesson plan ideas

6 hours worth of content
- 20 min video, 20 min presentations/guided instruction, 20 min practice? Some variation of this
Topic 1: Observational Techniques and Logic
- Video 1: Kid astronomy 14 min
- Video 2: Astronomy and Logic 7 min
- Logic of science
- Logical arguments for observing spherical Earth
- Practice Problems:
  - Easy: What is science/the scientific method?
  - Medium: Give an example of using the scientific method to observe something related to astronomy.
  - Hard: Eratosthenes’ measurement of the radius of the Earth
  - Hard: Parallax problem
Topic 2: Our solar system and the Sun
- Video 1: Planets 15 min
- Video 2: Planetary geology 5 min
- The different planets
  - Gas giants, rocky planets, ice giants
- The sun
- Special characteristics of the Earth
  - Habitable zone
  - Geological activity
- Practice Problems:
  - Easy: What are the three different types of planets? Which type is the Earth?
  - Medium: Explain why the atmosphere of Venus is so different to that of Earth (Hint: It has to do with the geology of the Earth)
  - Hard: Kepler’s laws problem
  - Hard: Habitable zone problem
Topic 3: Stars and nucleosynthesis
- Video 1: How do stars work 20 min
- What is a star
  - Gravitational collapse
- Nuclear Fusion
  - Fusion basics
  - Nucleosynthesis
- Different spectral types
  - The main sequence
  - Lifespans and luminosity
- Emission Spectra
  - Spectra basics
  - Fraunhofer lines
- Practice Problems:
  - Easy: Do bigger stars live longer or shorter than smaller stars?
  - Medium: Explain at the atomic level why emission lines exist in spectra (Hint: Electrons are important)
  - Medium: Calculate the temperature of the surface of the sun given a blackbody diagram and Wien’s displacement law
  - Hard: Stellar nucleosynthesis chain problem
Topic 4: Galaxies
- Video 1: Types of galaxies 15 min
- Video 2: How big is our galaxy 10 min
- Different types of galaxies
- Galaxy formation
- Universe on a large scale
- Redshift and galactic archaeology
- Practice Problems:
  - Easy: What galaxy do we live in?
  - Medium: Why does light from far away galaxies get redder as it approaches us
  - Hard: Galactic rotation velocity and total mass calculation
Topic 5: Exotic objects in the universe
- Video 1: Black holes 6 min
- Video 2: Neutron stars 7 min
- Video 3: Quasars 10 min
- Neutron stars
- Black holes
- Quasars Practice Problems:
  - Easy: How do we know that black holes exist?
  - Medium: Why do neutron stars spin so fast?
  - Hard: Black hole of density water given Scwarzschild radius
  - Hard: Gas temp going into quasar?
Topic 6: Cosmology and the Big Bang
- Video 1: The big bang 13 min
- Video 2: Dark matter and dark energy
- The Hubble Constant and derivation
- Evidence for the big bang
- Evidence for dark matter and dark energy Practice Problems:
  - Easy: What does the Hubble constant tell us?
  - Medium: Why do we think the Big Bang happened? Using the Hubble constant, find the age of the universe.
  - Hard: How much dark matter in a universe from rotation curves
  - Hard: Redshift and time of universe problem
  - Very Hard: Using the Friedmann equation, how does a universe with only dark energy expand with time?