Aurora Days for the 2021/22 academic year will run on 18th October 2021, 13th December 2021, 7th February 2022, 28th March 2022, 23rd May 2022 and 18th July 2022. These are specially designed sessions for SEND groups that run twice a term.
While you are of course welcome to visit at any time with SEND groups Aurora Days are dedicated slots where we hand the Observatory over to you without any other school groups on site. This means that we are able to dedicate more time to you answering your space questions and making you visit as enjoyable and easy as possible.
We are developing our Aurora Day programme further throughout the 2021/22 academic year and have a SEND forum to help inform the programme. Please take a look at our website for more details, we would love to have you with us.
Aurora Days are made up of the following components: a planetarium show alongside our workshop.
Planetarium Show
Planetarium shows take place in the Peter Harrison Planetarium and are delivered live by Royal Observatory astronomers. On Aurora Days we have:
Starry Skies
This show takes the audience on a tour of some of the most beautiful aspects of our Solar System. It was developed in collaboration with our local autism spectrum disorder visitors and their families and has consistently received fantastic feedback since it launched. It is presented live by one of our astronomers and runs at a much calmer pace than many of our other school shows. The lighting levels used are higher for this show so the planetarium never becomes pitch black and the music and narration is kept to a minimum. If your students have any questions about space at the end our astronomer will be there to answer them.
If your students are working at KS2/KS3 level and are able to cope with a show that runs at a more moderate pace with more content, then speak to our astronomers who can talk to you about an alternative offer.
Workshop
Our interactive workshop takes place in one of three purpose-built Lloyds Register Foundation learning spaces and are designed to encourage active learning and hands-on scientific enquiry.
Searching the Solar System
This workshop focuses on different aspects of the solar system and uses multi-sensory practical activities to get students to learn more about some of their closest neighbours in space. There are a number of different activities that can be done as part of this workshop, and you are able to choose a selection which will be the most interesting and applicable to your students, which means we can tailor this workshop to suit your needs. Please be sure to chat to a member of the ROG education team when you are planning your visit so they can advise.