Projects

The idea of the Catch a Star program is to encourage students to work together, to learn about astronomy and discover things for themselves by researching information on an astronomical object.

The goal of the European Astronomy Contest Catch a Star is to stimulate the creativity and independent work of students from European secondary schools, to strengthen and expand their astronomical knowledge and skills, and to help the spread of information technologies in the educational process.

Catch a Star is a contest that has been held as a result of the collaboration between the European Association for Astronomy Education (EAAE) and European Southern Observatory (ESO).

Project Coordinator: Hristo Stoev (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).

Sponsored by 

As Eratosthenes 2200 years ago, we will measure the Earth's circunference at summer's solstice (H.N, i.e. 21 June). All schools can participate: they will have to send us their measurement.

The method consists of putting a staff on the floor exposed to the sun, measure its shadow when the sun is at its highest point, deduce the angle of the solar rays compared with the vertical staff, then exchange your results with another class under another latitude. Then, a few geometrical drawings and a rule of three give you the length of earth's radius.

The video you can download at the following link (wmv, 14Mb, 2 min, credit: Planetario de Milano) gives you a good idea of the project's science.

In 2009, the project was also developed between schools of Barcelona (Spain), of the Republic of Bénin and of France.

June 21, 2015 measurement: http://eratostenes-unawe-region-andina.blogspot.com.ar

September 21, 2015 measurement: http://df.uba.ar/eratostenes

Find a Sundial and... Show It To Us!

Since Man became aware about the periodic character of the day, the attempts to measure time have been systematic. Using the beat of the heart and by developing simple instruments, Man started to try to measure time.

At a certain point our human ancestors guessed the time of day by observing the sun's movement from morning until night. Sunrise and sunset required no calculation, mid day (or noon) was a little bit trickier, but the time between these three reference moments left them baffled.

Their observations showed them that shadows cast changed in length and moved throughout the day. After a while they understood that it would be easier to measure the passing of time by observing the change in shadow lengths than by observing the movement of the Sun directly. This was the birth of Sundials.

During History, sundials have evolved into many forms and are widely spread out European countries.

So we challenge you: Find a Sundial... and tell us about it.

Moonwalkers intends to be a website to promote students learning about the Moon.

Observe the Moon and present your lunar observations as a project or as a short video for the Moonwalkers contest.

EAAE's intent is to propose to teachers and students to observe the Moon on the nights of clear sky.

By doing this they can try to discover changes across the Moon’s phases, they can discuss the motion of the Moon and the Earth around the Sun, as well debate about the origin of the Moon; students should also become familiar with the many interesting features on the Moon and they can learn about the many active features on the Moon’s surface.

Coordinators of the Project Moonwalkers:
Veselka Radeva, National Representative, Bulgaria.
Gordana Apostolovska, National Representative, Republic of North Macedonia.

More information about Space Art 2023 contest on November 1st

The idea of the Space Art program is to encourage young students (6 to 18 years old) to imagine about the Universe, to learn about astronomy and discover things for themselves by researching information on an astronomical object.

Its aim is to encourage creativity and independent work amongst young students, and to strengthen and expand their astronomical knowledge and creativity. Art is a perfect way to achieve this.

Space Art is a site where students' vision can be placed and shared. We want students to represent through drawings or photographs their favourite astronomical object.

They just have to look for it in the sky, books or the internet and then draw it or make a picture of it using photography or combined techniques.

Space Art is organised by the European Association for Astronomy Education (EAAE) and sponsored by European Southern Observatory (ESO).

Project Coordinators: Ivo Jokin and Antonio Acedo.

Email project: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The project intends to be a school collaborative project by which the schools can learn more about the Sun's apparent movement and about photography using a pinhole camera. Though the technique is in theory quite simple, pinhole camera's are very didactical, as they allow students to learn about photography theory and practice and might allow students to obtain very beautiful images.