Selecting a Target

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Selecting a Target

• Observational Science
• the Five Skills of Geography

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Observational Science

• What it is
• Five key skills of geography
• Link to ISSEarthKAM and good science and geography

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Three Types of Science

• Experimental Science
• Scientific method
• Manipulating variables

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Three Types of Science

• Theoretical Science
• Application of scientific logic and laws

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Three Types of Science

• Observational Science
• Seeing less than manipulating or applying laws

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Purposes

• Answer fundamental questions about the Earth
  system

• One of NASAs key areas of interest

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Military Applications
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Earth Science Applications
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Homeland Security Applications
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Guidelines for Conducting Observational Science

• Select a theme to study
• Select Areas of Interest (AOIs)
• Regions as examples
• Regions as anomalies
• Regions as analogues
• Limit your study

• Prepare a research plan
• See Five Skills of Geography
• Collect data
• Images and supporting information
• Conduct your analysis
• Make your conclusions
• Verify

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Five Core Skills

• Asking geographic questions
• Where?
• Acquiring geographic information
• Gathering data
• Organizing geographic information
• Maps, reports, and more
• Analyzing geographic information
• What does it mean?
• Answering geographic questions
• What have I learned?

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Why skills are important

• Provide necessary tools and techniques for
  thinking spatially
• Necessary for making wise personal, community,
  governmental, and business decisions

Community, government, and business decisions
Life skills
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Asking Geographic Questions

• Why things are where they are and how they got
  there
• Where is it located?
• Why is it there?
• What else is there, too?
• What are the consequences of the location and
  associations of things there?
• What is being observed?
• What are my perceptions of it?

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Asking Geographic Questions

• Skills
• ? Students identify geographic issues and themes
  and/or define problems
• ? Students ask geographic questions
• ? Students can plan and organize a geographic
  research project
• Specify a problem
• Pose a research question or hypothesis
• Identify areas in need of investigation
• Test the hypothesis/answer the question

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Acquiring Geographic Information

• What is geographic information?
• Information about locations,
• Human and physical characteristics of locations,
• About the geographic activities and conditions of
  humans who live there
• Kinds of geographic data?
• Primary
• Images, field work, community-based learning
• Secondary
• Texts, maps, statistics, photos, multimedia,
  computer-based databases, telephone directories

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Acquiring Geographic Information

• Skills
• Locating and collecting data
• Images, maps, and a variety of other sources
• ? Observation and systematic recording of
  information
• ? Interpretation of maps and other graphics

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Organizing Geographic Information

• Many ways to organize and present geographic
  information
• Annotated images
• Maps
• Graphs, tables, spreadsheets, and timelines
• Oral and written reports
• Multimedia pictures, maps, graphs, captions, web
  pages
• Poems, collages, plays, journal writing, and
  essays

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Analyzing Geographic Information

• Seeking patterns, relationships, and connections
  within geographic information
• Maps/Images spatial patterns
• Graphs trends/relationships
• Data sequences, correlations, trends
• Texts explanations/syntheses

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Answering Geographic Questions

• Developing and making generalizations
• Key ideas that students should learn at the
  culmination of a process of inquiry
• Requires that students
• Use the information they have collected,
  processed analyzedOR
• Take the evidence they have acquired to make
  decisions, solve problems, or make judgments on a
  question, problem, or issue

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Answering Geographic Questions

• Last step in the process of inquiry

Organizing geographic information
Acquiring geographic information
Analyzing geographic information
Answering geographic questions
Asking geographic questions
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Problem Based Learning
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Remote Sensing

• science and art of identifying, observing, and
  measuring an object without coming into direct
  contact with it
• --a tool and technique

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Remote Sensing

• Process
• Detection and measurement of ELECTROMAGENTIC
  RADIATION at different wavelengths reflected or
  emitted from distant objects/materials
• Data provides ability to identify Earth features
  materials

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Remote Sensing

• Purpose
• Identify and categorize by class/type, substance,
  and spatial distribution
• e.g., features in a scene (presented as image)
  classified into categories or classes
• Image--gtthematic map
• e.g., land use, vegetation types, rainfall
• Can also abstract information about an object

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Color

• Objects appear different at different wavelengths
  and produce different information,
• Computers can be used to produce a color image
  from a black and white remote sensing data set.

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Remote Sensing

• Methods

PLATFORM e.g., pigeon, balloon, airplane,
satellite
Remote sensing instrument e.g., radiometer,
radar, spectrometer AVHRR, MODIS, ETM
Object, area, phenomenon viewed by sensor system
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Remote Sensing

• Platform instrument Satellite sensor
• Data from Earth orbiting satellites transmitted
  using radio waves to ground stations--gtdigital
  image.
• Digital image--gttiny shapes PIXELS
• (represent the energy reflected or
  emitted by each pixel)

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Remote Sensing

• PIXEL area on ground ( image) that is a
  measure of the sensors ability to resolve (see)
  objects of different sizes

15 meters
15 meters
Higher resolution (smaller pixel area)--gtable to
see smaller objects of pixels in an
image--gtcalculate area of a scene
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Satellites

• Human-made spacecraft placed in space to orbit
  another body
• Crewed e.g., space shuttle, ISS
• Uncrewed e.g., TERRA

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Satellite Orbits

• Each satellite has a set path above Earth orbit
• varies with satellites purpose
• polar orbit (circular above poles to survey all
  or portion of Earth as it turns below)
• geosynchronous orbit (above equator at 35,888 km
  to match and floating over a point on equator
• Low Earth orbit e.g., Space shuttle
• Elliptical orbit

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Why bother?

• Provide way-cool information