College Students’ Preinstructional Ideas About Stars and Star Formation

Abstract

Abstract This study Note 1 investigated the beliefs about stars that students hold when they enter an undergraduateintroductory astronomy course for nonscience majors. Students’ preinstructional ideas were investigated throughthe use of several student-supplied-response SSR surveys, which asked students to describe their ideasabout topics such as what is a star, how is starlight created, how are stars formed, are all stars the same, andmore. The results from more than 2,200 responses suggest that although students often have some initialknowledge about stars, their knowledge is often incomplete or incorrect in important ways that could negativelyimpact instructional objectives. 1. INTRODUCTION As we look into the sky during the daytime, what we see is dominated by the incredibly bright Sun. In theSun’s absence, we see points of light—virtually all of which are stars. The Sun, our closest star, plays atremendous role in the physical processes on Earth, which allow life to exist. Furthermore, the presenceand patterns of stars have played important roles in human beliefs, primarily through religions, calendars, andmythologies. A tremendous number of stars populate the universe, and the study of their nature and evolutionis a primary subdiscipline of astronomy. Given the importance of stars in our cultural and scientific history, itshould come as no surprise that stars are considered a central topic in astronomy.From a survey of U.S. college syllabi available on the Internet at that time, Slater