3. newsletter

Dear reader,

This is already the third newsletter dedicated to the transnational project STARS (Successfully Teaching AstRonomy in Schools) that publishing house of primary and secondary schools´ textbooks EXPOL PEDAGOGIKA ltd. has started to implement in November 2017 in cooperation with six other partners from three European countries – Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria. This is the way in which we would like to give you more information about what we have done so far in the project, how we are going to continue and what is planned for the next period of the project.

We believe that together we will succeed in achieving our main goal – to support the teachers teaching astronomy at lower secondary education. Various researches have shown the fact that in most education systems in Central and Eastern Europe, teachers struggle to highlight the interrelation of subjects due to lack of resources and sometimes even information on certain topics. This is extremely valid information with regard to the instruction of astronomy-related subjects.

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STARS partners

This project has been co-funded with the support of the Erasmus+ Programme, K2 action, Strategic Partnerships in School Education. Project Agreement Number: 2017-1-SK01-KA201-035344

The current publication reflects the author´s view only and neither the Slovak National Agency, nor the European Commission are responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.

Since November 2017, the publishing house of primary and secondary schools´ textbooks EXPOL PEDAGOGIKA ltd. situated in Bratislava (www.expolpedagogika.sk) has been implementing the transnational project STARS (Successfully Teaching AstRonomy in Schools) whose aim is to support the teachers teaching astronomy at lower secondary education. The project has entered its second half this year. There are six partners from three different countries participating at the project together with us – Slovakia, Czech Republic and Bulgaria. Our aim is to equip teachers with comprehensive methods and tools to improve their teaching practices, as well as concrete ideas of how to present a given topic in astronomy-related curriculum.

What have we done in the project so far?

The university partners from Czech Republic and Bulgaria have been working on the first version of the content of 1st intellectual output of the project – Methodical Handbook for Teachers during the first half of the year 2018. This version was presented to other project partners at the 2nd Transnational project meeting in Pilsen. In July 2018, we have also prepared and distributed our second online newsletter with the up-to-date information about the project, its partners and planned activities to the wide database of contacts.

2nd Transnational project meeting of STARS partners in Pilsen

The meeting took place in the cosy hotel called Purkmistr – Pivovarský dvůr in Pilsen during 20th – 22nd August 2018. The representatives of all project partners from three different countries (Slovakia, Czech Republic, and Bulgaria) attended the meeting.

• Grammar School Metodova 2 Bratislava; M7 ltd. (SVK)
• The University of West Bohemia in Pilsen; Primary School at Říčany Wood (CZ)
• Bulgarian Astronomical Society; High School of Mathematics akad. Kiril Popov, Plovdiv (BG)

The coordinator and the organiser of the project meeting was textbooks´ publishing house EXPOL PEDAGOGIKA ltd. in cooperation with the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen.

Content of the meeting was:

• presentation and analysis of the 1st drafted version of methodical materials of the project STARS – Methodological Handbook for Teachers (O1)
• proposal of the organisation of testing and evaluation phase of the created methodical materials at partner schools
• plan of the development of the 2nd intellectual output of the project - STARS Training Programme for Teachers (O2)

The aim of the meeting was:

• to present created 1st version of methodical materials to other project partners in order to get comments, suggested improvements and feedback for the authors (BAS, UWB)
• to propose and approve structure and timetable of the testing and evaluation process of Methodological Handbook for Teachers (O1) at partner schools (SK, CZ, BG)

What is going to happen next in the project?

• implementation of all comments and improvements of project partners into created methodical materials and their preparation for testing and evaluation process at partner schools
• development of the final version of Methodological Handbook for Teachers based on the output from testing and evaluation process conducted at partner schools
• preparation of the pilot version of the STARS Training Programme for Teachers (O2)

Where can you find us?

More information about the project STARS and what is currently happening is available at our official webpage and at our Facebook profile:

web: http://www.project-stars.com/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/pg/project.stars.erasmus/posts/?ref=page_internal