Window to the Stars: Using a Graphical User Interface: A Brittain at the OAE’s 5th Shaw-IAU Workshop
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Window to the Stars: Using a graphical user interface to the TWIN stellar evolution code for student
This was a talk given at the 5th Shaw-IAU Workshop on Astronomy for Education, organised by the IAU Office of Astronomy for Education (OAE, http//astro4edu.org).
Window To The Stars (WTTS) provides a graphical user interface (GUI) to the TWIN stellar evolution code originally written for professional astrophysicists by Peter Eggleton. As Robert Izzard and Evert Gleebeck stated in their 2006 paper: “[WTTS] removes the drudgery associated with the traditional approach to running the code, while maintaining the power, output quality and flexibility a modern stellar evolutionist requires.” In fact the GUI is user friendly enough for school children to use it: so that is what is being done. Over the past few years I have been working with Robert Izzard, the GUI’s author, to establish a programme for school children that can extend and enrich their learning. This presentation discusses the application of WTTS to student led stellar modelling projects.
About Andy Brittain:
Andy Brittain is a Physics Teacher and STEM Co-ordinator at Lady Eleanor Holles School in London, England. He has been teaching in UK secondary schools, mostly as Head of Physics, for a quarter of a century. He is a Schools Observatory Champion who specialises in school based research projects and STEM outreach.
About the 5th Shaw-IAU Workshop:
This year’s Shaw-IAU Workshop on Astronomy for Education focuses on two themes: one special practical astronomy education topic and one scientific topic. The special topic is astronomy education outside the classroom, looking at how astronomy can be taught in a diverse range of environments such as science centers, planetaria and youth clubs. The scientific topic is planetary atmospheres, both in the solar system and exoplanets as well as our own Earth. The workshop was organised by the IAU Office of Astronomy for Education (http://astro4edu.org/). More details can be found on: https://astro4edu.org/shaw-iau/5th-shaw-iau-workshop/schedule/
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