[meteorite-list] Meteorite Talk/Program Topics

[Gerald Flaherty]

Super, Rob! Super!!!
jerry
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Matson, Robert" <ROBERT.D.MATSON at saic.com>
To: "Meteorite-list Meteoritecentral" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Cc: "Al Mitterling" <almitt at kconline.com>; "'Robert Verish'" 
<bolidechaser at yahoo.com>
Sent: Friday, March 18, 2005 5:22 PM
Subject: [meteorite-list] Meteorite Talk/Program Topics


> Hi Al, Bob and List,
>
> On the subject of giving talks to the public on meteorites,
> Bob wrote:
>
>> ... thanks for reminding me that it may be better to
>> focus on only one aspect of our avocation, as opposed
>> to "shot-gunning" the audience with a topic such as:
>> "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Meteorites".
>
> Last Friday I took a day off from work and drove up to Ojai
> to give an astronomy talk to about 50 Girl Scouts (Juniors)
> and a dozen of their parents/troop leaders.  As this talk
> was meant to cover a sufficient number of topics for the
> girls to earn their astronomy badges, it was necessarily
> broad.
>
> However, as bad luck would have it, it was completely socked
> in last Friday night, so most of my preparations for covering
> the Moon, planets, stars, asteroids, comets, planetary nebulae
> and galaxies ended up being for naught.  I shifted gears and
> gave the talk indoors inside a large group cabin, with all the
> scouts on their cots/sleeping bags.  Basically a huge slumber
> party!
>
> I had printed up a bunch of star charts to hand out that were
> specific to that night's viewing (though applicable for the
> next month or so, ignoring the Moon and planet motions), so
> they could at least learn the basics of reading a star chart,
> and use one to learn a few constellations, star names, and
> so forth.  The girls showed a lot of interest and asked
> surprisingly good questions given their ages (~9-11).
>
> Several weeks earlier I purchased over a kilo of ordinary
> chondrites from Dean Bessey (many of them NWA 869) with the
> initial intent of giving them out as prizes for answering
> questions or asking good ones.  But Dean was very generous
> and I ended up with more material than I expected -- enough
> that every scout could have their own meteorite if I cut
> the majority of them in half.  So I fired up the saw and
> cut ~50 specimens (which reminds me that I think I need a
> new saw blade now!), weighed each one and made labels for
> all of them.
>
> When we got to the subject of asteroids, it was a natural
> transition point to explaining about meteoroids, meteors and
> meteorites.  You should have seen those girls' faces light up
> when they learned that they would each be going home with their
> very own meteorite!  I handed a bunch around for the scouts to
> inspect (along with a rare earth magnet) while I continued
> talking, and then the questions started coming fast and
> furious -- how old are they?  Where are they from?  Who found
> them?  How do you know they're meteorites?  Where are meteorites
> found?  Do all meteorites look like this?  What are the
> different types?  Which ones are the rarest?  How many have you
> found?  Where do you hunt for them?  How do we hunt for them?
> Are they hot when they land?  How often do they fall?  And
> on and on...
>
> I eventually moved on to other subjects (Deep Impact, the Mars
> Rovers, different star types, the Milky Way, the Andromeda
> Galaxy, etc.), but every few minutes a new question about
> meteorites would pop up.  Clearly the hands-on approach to
> astronomy has a big impact on interest level.
>
> Anyway, it was a great experience for me as I was very encouraged
> by the high interest -- both from the scouts AND their mothers.
> (Quite a few of the moms came up to thank me afterward and tell
> me how much they had learned, which meant a lot to me.)  In
> retrospect, it was a blessing in disguise that it was cloudy as
> there is no way I would have had time to cover all the topics that
> I had originally planned, and the scouts probably ended up asking
> a lot more questions the way it turned out.
>
> --Rob
>
>
>
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