The purpose of this study was to develop a program based on the Earth system based program to help students achieve science literacy. This program was designed to be connected across grade levels, and contents of the program were constructed to have meaningful interdisciplinary context. All the activities in the program were inquiry-based, and understanding of the nature of science was considered essential throughout the program. In addition, appreciation and stewardship for the Earth system were systematically emphasized on any grade level. Design of the program applied U.S. National Science Education Standards for the quality of and conditions for school science programs.

본 연구에서는 교양지구과학과목을 수강하는 36명의 예비과학교사를 대상으로 가상현실(VR)의 사용을 한 차시에 걸쳐 시도하였다. 수업을 하기 전과 후에 구성주의 학습환경 조사(CLES)를 실시하였다. CLES의 주된 초점은 수업이 학생중심 수업환경을 얼마나 잘 보조하고 지원하는가다. 학생의 자신의 수업환경에 대한 사전 및 사후검사는 여섯가지 하위 영역으로 나뉜다.: 학생적절성, 비판적 시각, 교실통제의 나눔, 학생 간의 타협, 과학적 불확정성, 태도이다. 아울러 가상현실에 대한 미래교사의 인식에 대한 설문지도 실시하였다. 미래의 과학교사들이 가상현실 자료를 교실에서 사용하는 것에 대하여 어떻게 생각하는가를 본 연구를 통해 알아보고자 했다. 이들 결과를 바탕으로 교사 주도의 수업환경을 학생의 적극적 참여를 유도하는 수업에로의 변화를 도모하는 것과 같은 기존에 연구되지 않은 측면을 제안하여가상현실의 잠재력에 대한 보다 완벽한 이해를 꾀하려 하였다.

Variabilities in the solar wind cause disturbances throughout the heliosphere on all temporal and spatial scales, which leads to changeable space weather. As a view of space weather forecasting, in particular, it is important to know direct and indirect causes modulating the space environment near the Earth in advance. Recently, there are discussions on a role of the interaction of the solar wind with Mercury in affecting the solar wind velocity in the Earth’s neighborhood during its inferior conjunctions. In this study we investigate a question of whether other parameters describing the space environment near the Earth are modulated by the inner planets’ wake, by examining whether the interplanetary magnetic field and the proton density in the solar wind observed by the Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) spacecraft, and the geomagnetic field via the Dst index and Auroral Electrojet index (AE index) are dependent upon the relative position of the inner planets. We find there are indeed apparent variations. For example, the mean variations of the geomagnetic fields measured in the Earth’s neighborhood apparently have varied with a timescale of about 10 to 25 days. Those variations in the parameters we have studied, however, turn out to be a part of random fluctuations and have nothing to do with the relative position of inner planets. Moreover, it is found that variations of the proton density in the solar wind, the Dst index, and the AE index are distributed with the Gaussian distribution. Finally, we point out that some of properties in the behavior of the random fluctuation are to be studied.