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Hello from Taunton (Somerset)

ian61

By ian61
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ian61

ian61

Posted
Posted

Greetings all,

As a science teacher I have always had an interest, being as I am of the generation who saw Armstrong land on the moon Astronomy was my first experience of science outside the classroom.  In my teens I was a member of the Cardiff Astronomical Society (back in the 70's).  I have always had a telescope and currently still own an old 4.5in newtonian on equatorial mount that I will almost certainly have to upgrade before too long.  It was however good enough to let me show my children the rings of Saturn, moons of Jupiter , the pleiades etc.  It is also fine for projecting  an image of the sun into a box and I have witnessed most visible transits of Mecury and Venus since 1973 (Mercury transit in Nov that year).  The last of Venus was a bit of a damp squib - having seen the fantastic pictures on the internet live from Hawaii and Mt Wilson we were on the brow of the old Hill Fort at Norton Fitzwarren at 4.30am only to be clouded out just as the sun was rising over the quantocks.

My current resurgence of interest is however as a teacher - we have been given some funds for telescopic equipment for the school. I have been doing some research but fortunately one of our parents is a real expert and has put some very good proposals to us that we are considering and also pointed me to this forum.  No doubt I will be displaying huge technical ignorance as regards the technology in my future posts but I do understand spectra (I teach aspects of spectroscopy at A level) and much of the physics/chemistry of space - I have given talks to the students on possibilities of extraterrestrial life (based around the Green bank/Drake equation) etc. (my dissertation was on the 'origin of life from the prebiotic environment'). Academically I am a bit of a butterfly - I know a little about a lot but not a great deal about anything in particular. 

Cheers,

Ian61

I attach a photo of my old Tasco to amuse any older members of the forum who remember them,
post-37356-0-52168300-1401192869_thumb.j I thought this was a big expense as a student back in about '82.

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swag72

swag72

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Hi Ian and welcome to SGL, I'm originally a Taunton girl myself and still get back there every 4 months at the moment. Good to see you on board, I hope that you enjoy your time here.

Look forward to seeing you around :smiley:

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Siriusmeg

Siriusmeg

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Hello and welcome from a fellow teacher - I'm sure your students will really enjoy getting to grips with this project (hopefully you will too   :smiley: ).  If they are anything like my lot, they will have lots of ideas for research projects themselves too - this could be the start of something big   :grin:

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JamesF

JamesF

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Welcome to SGL from just down the road :)

Funny, the things you miss.  I lived in Milverton for ten years and we've been here for another ten and I never knew there was a hill fort at Norton Fitzwarren.

James

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