Here are some of the activities we did and some of the insights we derived from our discussions we had after the activities.

Mind-mapping with students from Aditi international school
Aditi is a reputed international school in Bangalore for Children from affluent families. We conducted a twenty minute workshop with a small group of children from eight grade. The students were familiar with mindmapping so we divided them into three groups and asked them to put down their thoughts/ associations about the moon.
We looked at the maps generated and some of the key categories that emerged were -
Indian culture- Ganesha hates the moon, moon is called Chandra in Kannada
Science related- Mass attracts mass, revolution of the moon, tidal forces
Physical attributes of the moon- Rock, mountains, holes, craters
Associated objects- Blob of ice-cream, Made of cheese, looks like a football, like a balloon in the sky
Space exploration- Kalpana Chawla, Controversy around Neil Armstrong, Russia vs. USA, Apollo mission

Stories

Cartoonns/Comics- Moon is a place for bad guys, Krypton, Russian/ Greek fable (Fat lady falling on the moon to create craters
Imagination- Marshmallow factories, rabbit shaped crater, Chinese live there, imaginary friend
Childhood- Chanda mama
Feelings- Lonely, Beauty of the full moon, Makes beaches look nice, Scary like in ghost stories, la di da makes me smile
Ownership- Can Santosh’s grandpa own the moon? will people live on the moon?

Some key ideas/ insights
Stories about the moon (or even space) are derived from popular media such as Films, cartoons and comics. Stories and associations from Indian mythology and culture are hardly mentioned.
We found that associations with balloons and foot balls could suggest a tactile final product that rolls, floats, changes shape and colour in a an interactive way. Some other words that came up during brainstorming were video games, cosmic football match, kick-able bombard-able moon. The story of the fat lady creating craters took us back to Neil Armstrong's footprint on the moon and possibilities of leaving an impression to mark one’s experiences on our ‘Moon vehicle’!
Also we noticed that when space shifts out of the context of science into popular culture one’s perception of it shifts from grey to colourful. Similarly we realized the perception of the moon is completely dull as compared to the lively picture painted of the other celestial bodies. Another jump in perception is the shift between viewing the moon from afar and actually being on the moon. The lunar landscape does not capture one’s imagination as much as the moon when viewed from the earth. “There is no dark side of the moon its all dark”- a young Pink Floyd fan.

Visit to the Museum

We visited the Vishveshwaraiya Science museum in Bangalore and after coming back just put down our thoughts on what we felt was good and worked and what did not.

Really bad graphics and type (especially kannda)
Mouse in armour to prevent theft! chained objects which restricted free movement.
Many theories are practically demonstrated at the push of a button.
Colour coding of space section involved very few colours. Grey, red, black, blue and white.
Public interaction- Quiz
Walk through experience- Led display and walk through a cell. Involvement of the whole physical self rather than just our senses and fingers/ small body parts.
Was able to control actions of bodies/object ‘far away’ from us just by using simple scientific principles. (Ball movement, moving objects in soap water to study streamlined bodies etc.)
Some memento from the experience would be nice. For example, in the planetarium, one was given a printed sheet of their weights in different planets calculated from their weight on earth. (The same device was available at the museum, but did not involve a ‘take away’)

Children who live near the yelahanka market road at certad campus

For the preliminary stage of our research we had interviewed two girls monica and bhavana from our neighbourhood. we went back to meet them again as they wanted to introduce us to their other friends.

We walked to their lane in the evening and asked if we could talk to them and document the process in video. They were eager to talk but hesitant about being photographed, but we handed them the camera and asked them to shoot whatever they wanted to, after this point they were fine with us shooting them.
Amongst the new girls we met were Gamya and sucharita. Gamya's mother was concerned and wanted her to come back soon so that she could finish he homework. Gamya showed us her science book where she had copied copious notes about meteors, planets and cells from her school library in the period set aside for library work. She was very interested in science and wanted to become a doctor. Sucharita told us about her bharatnatyam dancing class and her daily after school tuitions.
We asked them how they collected information for their projects, besides going to the library. Some of them used the local cyber cafe. In school however, they have no internet access but have computer lessons about using Power Point, Excel etc.
On reaching the park we realised that our campus was just two minutes away so we decide to take them to our class. The older ones were fascinated by the Moon chart, especially by the latin translations, the lines of latitude and longitude and the craters. They said that they had never realised that the moon looked like this. Gamya seemed confused about how one would see the earth from the moon.
She wanted us to give her some information for her notebook.
They immediately started drawing on the whiteboard. They started of by writing facts and then narrating stories and even singing songs about the moon (from a popular hindi film Saawariya). Bhavana and Monica started making a Powerpoint presentation on the moon but we had to stop there as it was getting late and they needed to get back home. On the way back, they began arguing about whether the moon was actually bigger than the stars. Rina ran ahead and began measuring with her fingers how Sucharita's size changed as she moved further away. She tried to convince Gamya that the moon was really much smaller than the stars but Gamya was not convinced. She said 3 suns make a star and three stars make a moon. using some pebbles lying on the street we finally convinced her that the moon was the smallest of the three. When we reached their houses Monica's mother began asking us what we were doing and invited us to visit her when we were free.

Some conclusions drawn from this experience:

- Confirmed that the experience had to involve the whole body- jumping, running, moving
- There is a huge gap between what is fascinating for the Aditi students and what interests these children, how can our project bridge this gap?
- Parents are an important part of education- how can we connect with them through our project.
- Fascination with the scale of the moon compared to ourselves and the earth, with what it really feels like to be on the moon, looking at our planet from the moon.

Confirmed that the experience had to involve the whole body- jumping, running, moving
also the impportance of being able to
there is a huge gap between what is fascinating for the Aditi students and what interests these children, how can our project bridge this gap?
parents are an important part of education- how can we connect with them through our project.
Fascination with the scale of the moon compared to ourselves and the earth, with what it really feels like to be on the moon, looking at our planet from the moon.