LIGO e-Lab News: Sept. 2008
From I2U2
Here is a brief tutorial that you can use to navigate the LIGO e-Lab's key features
Contents |
[edit] Find the e-Lab
- Surf to www.i2u2.org, then
- Click the tab marked e-Labs,
- Click on the tab marked e-Lab List,
- Find in the list the LIGO e-Lab and follow that link. This will give you the black-framed LIGO e-Lab Web site.
We hope to make this process easier in the future.
[edit] e-Lab Accounts
- In the past, we've suggested that users log in as guests. Now we're encouraging you to sign up for your own teacher accounts (hooray!). You can do this by clicking the link under "Need a teacher login?" on the e-Lab login page. If you attended this summer's I2U2 workshop, we've made an account for you. You'll receive the access information in another message.
- Once you have a teacher account, you can add student accounts yourself. Instructions for adding students are behind the registration link on the teacher menu bar (behind teacher home instead of student home)
- Teacher and student accounts are necessary for you to utilize the key features of the e-Lab such as the log book and the authoring of posters.
[edit] Teacher Features
- After you log in to the e-Lab, you'll see that the pages behind the Teacher Home link give you resources related to the instructional use of the e-Lab. Here you'll find rubrics, connections to standards, ideas for studies (investigations), a sample study and registration help.
[edit] Student Features
- After your students click the Student Home link and surf a couple of brief introductory pages, they will reach the beginning of the e-Lab. From here they will use the link bar across the top and the sidebar menu to explore the e-Lab resources.
- The Study Guide link on the Library sub menu is a key location since it provides your students a road map to guide them through the investigations that they will develop.
- If you hit the View Posters link on the posters sub menu and click "all," you can see several posters that high school students have completed.
[edit] Bluestone - the Heart of the LIGO e-Lab
- You'll see a sidebar link for Bluestone on the e-Lab Web site. Bluestone is the Web-based data interface that allows you and your students to select and plot data sets from LIGO environmental sensors such as seismometers. The Tutorial link will show you a set of screen shots that illustrate the making of a plot. Bluestone plots will be the key building blocks of student investigations. The plots can be saved and uploaded onto posters.
[edit] Use the Log Book to Track Student Progress
- As students work their way around the milestone markers on the Study Guide road map (also called a workflow diagram), they will encounter popup screens on which they will see Log it! links. A Log it! link yields another popup in which students can record the evidence that they have met the current milestone before moving on to the next. As the teacher, you can view the contents of the student log books by clicking on the "My Logbook" link on the top of the screen.
LIGO and other I2U2 partners will undergo intensive evaluations of our e-Labs for the National Science Foundation during the current academic year. We will be looking for adventurous teachers who might be interested in participating in the evaluation process. We always welcome comments, questions and suggestions from e-Lab users. The aim is to make the e-Lab as useful as possible for supporting student inquiry.
On behalf of the LIGO I2U2 team,
Dale Ingram
LIGO Hanford Observatory
9/2008
