1 Formal Education K-12: “"Through the Eyes of Scientists” Teacher Professional Development Workshop, East Tennessee University, October 4-5, 2011 "Through the Eyes of Scientists" (TTEOS) funded by Planetary Thematic and Cassini EPO Solar System EPO (Cassini, Thematic) conducted a successful Professional Development (PD) workshop in Jonesborough, Tennessee in partnership with Eastern Tennessee State University and the International Storytelling Institute. 27 educators and three science coordinators from the Sullivan County Department of Education, Kingsport City Schools and the director of secondary education for Kingsport City Schools participated in two hands-on activities outlined in “Our Solar System Through the Eyes of Scientists.” Following the PD, 25 educators filled out evaluation surveys to provide feedback and suggestions about the program and its educational activities. All 25 gave the program an excellent rating and provided useful suggestions for improving the program, which becomes available online on NASA’s Solar System Exploration Web site (SSE) in December, The positive feedback included comments about the importance of the use of notebooks as a scientific tool in how they help students learn to think like scientists, as well as praise for the video biographies and inspirational stories of the NASA scientists featured throughout the curriculum. Lastly, educators were were enthusiastic and grateful to know how to easily access the curriculum on the SSE site.NASA’s Solar System Exploration Web site (SSE) Educators create a model to demonstrate how water flows over landforms Image sorting activity to classify objects in the solar system PD covered in local press - “…This professional development was fantastic! I will truly be a better teacher because of it! Thank you! - “…One of the most useful things about this conference was knowing how to access the curriculum on the NASA web site. Space is so cool!” - “…I am going to do these activities next week! The photos are incredible!”

2 Eyes on the Solar System interactive had nearly 500,000 unique visitors in the month of September, with many educators downloading the program, making it the most trafficked section of the NASA Solar System website. You guys are just great! Enough can never be said to thank you for letting us look over your shoulders and even to see through the eyes of the mission equipment. Thanks for opening my mind to a bigger universe out there and in here as well” Jim, Louisville, Kentucky “Congratulations! I am very happy with the facilities that this site gives us teachers, with the excellent amount of materials for research, along with our students” High School Teacher, Brazil “Eyes” is called out on blogs for educators: Free Tech 4 Teachers.com “"Eyes on the Solar System could be a great way for students to see how how far apart the planets, moons, and stars are in terms of kilometers and time. I used the tours on my Lenovo M90z ThinkCentre and found them to be well- suited to touch screen use.” A bunch of ideas from this teacher on how to use Eyes in the classroom -- iLearn Technology “This is a GREAT site to share with the whole class on a big screen (projector-connected computer or interactive whiteboard).” “Astronomy is so much better in 3D!!! Thanks!” Mr. Lanham, High School Physics and Astronomy, Georgia

3 Solar System Ambassadors: A new website for Ambassadors and other NASA volunteer networks, NASA Nationwide launched early October New website for Ambassadors and other NASA volunteer networks, NASA Nationwide JPL Funding