Students' Impressions Concerning Optical Telescopes and Visible Astronomical Light Documents

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Students' Impressions Concerning Optical Telescopes and Visible Astronomical Light 

written by Jeffrey Marx and Rebecca S. Lindell

We conducted post-instructional interviews with seventeen undergraduates from a general-science level astronomy class. Each interview lasted about fifteen-minutes, and students responded with a mix of verbal and graphical responses. The interview topics included roles of telescopes in astronomy, sources and properties of astronomical light, the relative importance of a telescope's magnification and light gathering ability, and light pollution. We concluded that students posses only a loose set of ideas regarding optical telescopes and visible astronomical light; however some potential common (mis)conceptualizations emerged.

Published September 9, 2004
Last Modified July 7, 2013

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