• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.32-42
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• 2011

The purpose of this study is to provide meaningful basic materials for organizing a science curriculum in future by analyzing the status and changes of contents about astronomical phenomena in textbooks according to the changes of the science curriculum of elementary school. A main target of analysis is science textbooks of elementary school in curriculums from 1st to 7th. For the analysis, the analytic frame based on contents in astronomy textbooks of teachers colleges and colleges of education was used. The result of the analysis is as in the following. First, astronomy accounted for average about 7% of all pages of textbooks in all of science curriculums. The 1st educational curriculum had the most learning quantity of 10.40%, and the 6th curriculum had the least quantity of 4.39%. These results show that astronomy was not a small part and was considered important in each science curriculum of elementary school considering that earth science accounted for 17-26% of all pages in elementary school science curriculum. Second, the things that have been dealt with in common in all science curriculums from 1st to 7th of elementary school are the shape of the earth, the rotation and the revolution of the earth, the occurrence of the seasons, the apparent motion of the sun, the status and motion of the moon, the movement of a star, the brightness and distance of a star, constellations, the sun, planets and others. These contents are expected to be dealt with continuously as basic contents to organize astronomy regardless of the changes of curriculum. Third, in science curriculum of elementary school, astronomical phenomena based on life experiences regarding the earth, the moon and the sun are mainly dealt with in the first and the second grade. Contents requiring principles-understanding and research are dealt with in the fifth and sixth grade. These results show that elementary school science curriculum dealing with astronomy reflects the developmental stages of students and considers principle of learning possibility.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.42 no.2
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• pp.289-309
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• 2022

In recent years, astronomy has been snowballing: including Higgs particle discovery, black hole imaging, extraterrestrial exploration, and deep space observation. Students are also largely interested in astronomy. The purpose of this study is to discover what needs to be improved in the current astronomy curriculum in light of recent scientists' researches and discoveries. We collected keywords from all papers published from 2011 to 2020 in four selected journals-ApJ, ApJL, A&A, and MNRAS- by R package to examine research trends. The curriculum contents were extracted by synthesizing the in-service teachers' coding results in the 2015 revised curriculum document of six subjects (Science, Integrated Science, Earth Science I, Earth Science II, Physics II, Convergence Science). The research results are as follows: first, keywords that appear steadily in astronomy are 'galaxies: formation, galaxy: active, star: formation, accretion, method: numerical.' Second, astronomy curriculum includes all areas except the 'High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena' area within the common science curriculum learned by all students. Third, it is necessary to review the placement of content elements by subject and grade and to consider introducing new concepts based on astronomy research keywords. This is an exploratory study to compare curriculum and the field of scientific research that forms the basis of the subject. We expect to provide implications for a future revision of the astronomy curriculum as a primary ground investigation.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.125-145
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• 2023

This study investigates the integration of astronomy-related topics in the Korean national science curricula spanning from 1945 to 2023. We analyze the placement and extent of astronomy content across different school levels. Astronomy contents in the science curricula have changed in response to social needs (e.g., practical knowledge required for agriculture and fishery) and advancement in astronomical research (e.g., the discovery of exoplanets and the suggestion of new cosmological parameters). Contents addressing the motions of celestial objects and stellar physical properties have remained relatively consistent. In the latest 2022 revised national curriculum, scheduled for implementation in 2024, several elements, such as coordinate systems, have been removed, while the inquiry activities using digital tools are emphasized. The incorporation of the cosmic perspectives in the national curriculum, as well as astronomy education within the context of education for sustainable development, remains limited even in the most recent curriculum. For future life revisions, the active participation of researchers is needed to reflect the latest astronomical research progress and scientific characteristics in the field of astronomy.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.29 no.spc1
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• pp.445-449
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• 1996

We introduce the National Science Curriculum issued by the Education Ministry in Korea. Astronomy should be given and taught as compulsory courses in Nature of elementary school, Science of middle school, General Science of high school, and as elective courses in Earth Science I, II. Astronomy concepts have been designed in sprial pattern. College levels of astronomy have been given as majoring in astronomy course, cultivating one for earth science pre-teacher students and cultural subjects for non-major students

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.41 no.6
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• pp.441-454
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• 2021

In this study, we propose the composition of contents on the area of astronomy for high school Earth Science elective courses for the 2022 revised curriculum based on high school students' perceptions of changes in Earth Science core concepts over the curriculum revisions, and analysis of learning elements in the area of astronomy for domestic and foreign Earth Science curriculum. Four Earth Science education experts compared and analyzed the astronomy contents presented in Korea, the US, British Columbia (BC) in Canada, Japan, and the International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (IBDP) curriculum. According to the survey results, high school students who answered that they were most interested in the core concepts of astronomy expressed a lot of regret that the contents related to astronomical observation were eliminated from the 2015 revised curriculum. As a result of comparing domestic and foreign curriculum, Korea and IBDP curriculum dealt with the largest amount of learning elements in astronomy. In the case of BC in Canada and IBDP, astronomy was offered as an independent subject, and the curriculums of Japan and Korea dealt with astronomy in the Earth Science subject. According to the results, it is necessary to develop general elective courses in Earth Science with astronomy-related contents with high discriminating power in order to strengthen astronomy education. Since astronomy requires background knowledge from various disciplines and inter-disciplinary learning was required, it is necessary to organize the career-related elective courses in Earth Science so that astronomy can be dealt with according to the knowledge structure of general Astronomy. Based on the research results, ways to organize astronomy contents for Earth Science elective courses were suggested.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.148-157
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• 2012

The purpose of this study was to analyze the terms of astronomy area used in six convergence science textbooks by 2009 curriculum revision. The results of this study were following; the first, the contents about astronomy occupied about 18.6% account of science contents. There were the terms which all textbooks used, but some terms were not used other text book, and the others were used in only one textbook. And the second, there were some terms of having certain concept which had described differently. It was suggested that it was necessary to the effort to prevent to descript same meaning terms differently and to make guideline for the depth and width of the terms.

• Journal of Science Education
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.142-151
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• 2009

The purpose of this study is to investigate how much the programs of astronomy museums reflect the contents and objectives of current science curriculums. To attain the aim, comparison and analysis on the museum programs and science curriclum have been made. Five domestic astronomy museums have been selected. The contents and forms of their programs have been studied and appreciated by assessment instruments for astronomy museum programs. The assessment instruments were devised in consideration of both the science curriculums of the Ministry of Education(1997) and the achievement and evaluation criteria of the Korea Institute of Curriculum and Evaluation. The findings of this study are summarized as follows: The astronomy museums reflect most of the learning elements of science curricula concerning astronomy. These results indicate that the astronomy museum as an informal education institute is comparatively well connected to science education. The 5thgrade science curriculum reflected mostly on the museum programs, and too many of the astronomy museum programs were in forms of panel exhibition. Science curricula fared well but they failed to reflect the curricular objectives, which resulted in relatively low assessment scores. It is suggested that the findings of this study can be a foundation and act as guidance for selecting and developing astronomy museum programs which include the contents of the science curriculums more substantially.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.925-934
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• 2016

For students, astronomy is not only interesting but also difficult to learn. However, there is a limit in learning astronomy in a school science setting since astronomy is vast subject. Fortunately, science museums can be helpful in overcoming this limitation. Experiences in science museum provide something that any descriptions or illustrations cannot give. Therefore, to maximize the educational effect, it is necessary to look at astronomical exhibits regarding the educational aspects and complement them. For these reasons, the purpose of this study is to investigate characteristics of exhibitions related to astronomy and how much the exhibitions reflect the contents of their science curricula. We selected famous science museums in Korea, America, and Japan and analyzed characteristics of their astronomy exhibition. We analyze these characteristics in the aspects of exhibition technology & media, presentation method and activity types. Also, this study figures out how content of exhibitions are connected to school science curriculum. The results are summarized as follows: First, Science Museums of America and Japan utilize interactive exhibits to raise participation. It implies that Science Museum of Korea needs Interactive Exhibits that provide a realistic experience of the universe. Second, the astronomy exhibits reflect some of the learning elements of their science curricula concerned with astronomy. However, these astronomical contents are included selectively and not according to their required curriculum. It means that many students lack the opportunity to study Astronomy in their schools. Therefore, the astronomy museum must reflect learning elements of science curricula concerned with astronomy in the exhibits.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.183-199
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• 2012

Previous Earth Science textbooks have mostly lacked the latest astronomical phenomena frequently being reported in mass media such as popular science magazines. One of the main directions in the revision of the 2009 National Curriculum of Korea is to actively include those phenomena. Furthermore, despite a close link between astronomy and physics, the concept of modern physics has not been actively introduced in Earth Science textbooks and at the same time the linkage of physics to astronomy has rarely been studies in physics textbooks. Therefore, the concept of integration among different fields in science is emphasized in the new National Curriculum. Transient phenomena in the high energy astrophysical objects are examples that reflect such issue. The purpose of this study is to introduce transferring a real-time data and making imaging of astronomical observations using e-Science. As a first step, we performed the first experiment for a large data transfer of astronomical observation between Korea and Japan using KOREN, a National Research and Education Test Network. We introduce actively on-going fields of e-Science in observational activities of astronomy and astrophysics, and their close interrelationship with scientific inquiry activities and public outreach activities. We discuss our experiment in the scientific and educational aspects to the primitive e-Science activity in the Korean astronomical society and, in turn, provide a prospective view for its application to the scientific inquiry activities and public outreach activities in the upcoming commercial Gbps-level internet environments.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.173-185
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• 2016

Since Daejeon observatory has been built as the first astronomical science museum(ASM) whose theme is astronomy and space, many ASMs have been built or are being built by the governmental support. ASMs are requested to perform an important role as the educational venue that can be experienced the scientific activities for supplementing regular science education. This study investigated the analysis of the connection to astronomy-related contents of science curriculum revised in 2009 for exhibits of 17 ASMs. As a result, exhibits of ASMs show the low reflectivity to science curriculum and are very biased to standard of accomplishment. That is, they are not sufficient enough for the students to reach the learning objectives. However the astronomical scientific activities which are hard to be performed in regular school curriculum can be experienced at ASMs. Additionally, since exhibits of ASMs are easy to access and accept, they can provide the effective educational activities and learning effect. Therefore, ASMs have to be improved for supplementing regular science education through the informal curriculum of astronomical scientific activities by the producing and displaying good astronomy-related exhibits.