HR: 1340h
AN: ED13E-0758    [Abstracts]
TI: Golfing with protons: using research grade simulation algorithms for online games
AU: * Harold, J
EM: harold@spacescience.org
AF: Space Science Institute, 4750 Walnut Street Suite 205, Boulder, CO 80301 United States
AB: Scientists have long known the power of simulations. By modeling a system in a computer, researchers can experiment at will, developing an intuitive sense of how a system behaves. The rapid increase in the power of personal computers, combined with technologies such as Flash, Shockwave and Java, allow us to bring research simulations into the education world by creating exploratory environments for the public. This approach is illustrated by a project funded by a small grant from NSF's Informal Science Education program, through an opportunity that provides education supplements to existing research awards. Using techniques adapted from a magnetospheric research program, several Flash based interactives have been developed that allow web site visitors to explore the motion of particles in the Earth's magnetosphere. These pieces were folded into a larger Space Weather Center web project at the Space Science Institute (www.spaceweathercenter.org). Rather than presenting these interactives as plasma simulations per se, the research algorithms were used to create games such as "Magneto Mini Golf", where the balls are protons moving in combined electric and magnetic fields. The "holes" increase in complexity, beginning with no fields and progressing towards a simple model of Earth's magnetosphere. The emphasis of the activity is gameplay, but because it is at its core a plasma simulation, the user develops an intuitive sense of charged particle motion as they progress. Meanwhile, the pieces contain embedded assessments that are measurable through a database driven tracking system. Mining that database not only provides helpful usability information, but allows us to examine whether users are meeting the learning goals of the activities. We will discuss the development and evaluation results of the project, as well as the potential for these types of activities to shift the expectations of what a web site can and should provide educationally.
UR: http://www.spaceweathercenter.org/
DE: 2720 Energetic particles, trapped
DE: 2730 Magnetosphere--inner
DE: 2753 Numerical modeling
DE: 0815 Informal education
DE: 0845 Instructional tools
SC: Education and Human Resourcese [ED]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting