Astronomy BINGO! Teaching Notes

PURPOSE

The terms which appear in the Vocabulary List are words which are likely to be used by FCPS Planetarium Teachers during site visits to classrooms or class visits to the planetarium--the more familiar students are with the meaning of these terms, the more likely they are to understand fundamental concepts in astronomy.

IMPLEMENTATION STRATEGIES

The activity may be used in a variety of ways by either classroom teachers or planetarium teachers:

As an "advance organizer" at the beginning of the astronomy unit;
As an "advance organizer" before the planetarium visit;
As an end-of-unit review following the planetarium visit.

PROVISIONING

Approximately one week before the activity, provide students with the Vocabulary List and require them to learn the meaning of the words (as either an in-class activity or homework assignment). For younger students, you may want to assign 10- or so words per day over a period of several consecutive days.

If you plan to provide visual clues for word definitions (which enhances student interest), then you will need to set up a large-screen display device connected to either a videodisc player or computer with Internet access, and/or a 35mm slide projector.

On game day, provide students with a hardcopy of the activity sheet, which includes one (1) Astronomy BINGO! card. In a one-hour period, it should be possible to play three- to four games, so you should have extra BINGO cards on-hand.

As the game is played, students should work independently and should not look at other students' BINGO cards or ask other students for help. Discourage students from asking questions by providing unambiguous word definitions--by asking the wrong question, it's possible that students may reveal the answer to other attentive students. Optionally, you may allow students to refer to the Vocabulary List Definitions (although it may be necessary to impose a time limit for looking up definitions, e.g., one- to two minutes per word).

As definitions are read, use a copy of the activity sheet to cross off the words from the vocabulary list. When it is time to check the answers on a winning BINGO card, this will help you to remember which words were used.

Possible prizes include either extra credit or astronomy-related candies such as "Milky Way" or "Mars" candy bars, "Starburst," "MoonPies," etc.

ASSESSMENT

A couple of suggested strategies for assessing what students have learned as a result of their participation in this activity:

Regardless of whether students have a winning BINGO! card, they should have been able to correctly identify numerous vocabulary words for which you provided definitions. Collect students' BINGO! cards and use a simple rubric to assess what they have learned, e.g., greater than five correct words earns a satisfactory performance rating; less than five is unsatisfactory (and may require remediation).
As the game is played, have students maintain a running list of the word definitions which they do not recognize (or are unsure). After the game(s) is/are finished, require students to refer to the Vocabulary List Definitions to find the words which match their list of unrecognized definitions and use those words correctly in a sentence or paragraph (good cross-curricular strategy).