Dublin/RYSS Space Weather/NASA Magnetospheric Multiscale [MMS] 2014
Digital Art Exhibition

Eighth grade students at Raul Yzaguirre School For Success [RYSS] [Houston, Texas], and fifth grade students at Dublin Intermediate School [Dublin, Texas] exhibited their Digital Art in Dublin, Texas [June, 2012] based on research of Space weather and the NASA MMS [Magnetospheric Multiscale] 2014 Mission. Click on the following links to view the online versions of the exhibition:

RYSS student Digital Art for exhibition

Dublin student Digital Art for exhibition

The students at both schools were tasked ... as a part of the ISTE [International Society of Technology for Education] - NASA Space Curriculum Development initiative ... to research the various topics/concepts about Space weather [Sun, Sunspots, solar flares, CMEs (Coronal Mass Ejections), solar winds, Earth, Earth's magnetic fields, Earth's magnetosphere, magnetic reconnection, auroas] as well as NASA's MMS 2014 Mission, and then translate the information in photo software as Digital Art. As a result, greater understanding and retention of the information came to the forefront with acquired skills of manipulating photographs ... utilizing various tools and filters within the software. This cognitive and creative process placed the students in an environment of hands-on with photo software and the requirement of researching the information [notetaking in Word] to translate it into Digital Art through visualization.

The RYSS students traveled to Dublin ISD [Dublin, TX] earlier [April 11/12, 2012] to not only mentor these fifth grade students [exhibitors], but also sixth, seventh and eighth grade students in the use of graphics software to create Digital Art.

Workshops

The mentorship process involved an intensive session of learning and project application.The RYSS eighth grade students succeeded in not only keeping the attention of the Dublin students, but also making them comfortable with the software and producing gratifying results. The groups of students were so engaged throughout the two days [middle school - day one; intermediate school - day two] that the teachers present during the process seemed secondary. The RYSS students had successfully gained a skill, and were empowered to convey what they knew to others.

Tom R. Chambers, Technology Applications teacher at RYSS, takes student engagement and empowerment seriously. Most of what is learned and produced transcends the classroom and school system to have community impact. As a result, his students are motivated to do more, and in this case, they became mentors for students at another school district [intermediate and middle].

Chambers opened the student Digital Art exhibition on June 9, and he gave the keynote speech for the opening of the Dublin ISD Summer Camp on June 11. The summer camp ... coordinated by Jennifer Miller, Instructional Technologist, Dublin ISD ... is a two-week process of intensive learning via Technology re: Space weather/NASA MMS 2014 Mission and Robotics [Engineering].

Chambers' speech.

Photos of the Dublin/RYSS Space Weather/NASA MMS 2014 Digital Art Exhibition:


Installation at Dublin High School.

Installation at Dublin Intermediate School.

Photographs for the manipulations were downloaded from NASA websites strictly for educational purposes.