McGraw-Hill offers various tools and technology products to support Explorations: An
Introduction to Astronomy, fourth edition. Instructors can obtain teaching aids by calling
the Customer Service Department at 800-338-3987 or contacting your local
McGraw-Hill sales representative.
NEW! Interactives
McGraw-Hill is proud to bring you an assortment of 23 outstanding
Interactives like no other. These include 17 new Interactives
and the 6 original Interactives from the third edition.
Each Interactive is now programmed in Flash for a stronger
visual appeal. These Interactives offer a fresh and dynamic
method to teach the astronomy basics. Each Interactive allows
users to manipulate parameters and gain a better understanding
of topics such as blackbody radiation, the Bohr model, a solar systembuilder,
retrograde motion, cosmology, and theH-Rdiagram
by watching the effect of these manipulations. Each Interactive
includes an analysis tool (interactive model), a tutorial describing
its function, content describing its principal themes, related exercises,
and solutions to the exercises.Users can jump between these
exercises and analysis tools with just the click of the mouse.
NEW! Starry Night CD
This planetarium software is now available free with every text.
It allows users to manipulate and take control of an accurate
visual representation of the sky. Users become active observers
and gain a far better understanding of how the sky works.
Online Learning Center:
www.mhhe.com/arny
McGraw-Hill offers a wealth of online features
and study aids that greatly enhance the astronomy
teaching and learning experience. The design
of the Arny Online Learning Center makes it
easy for students to take full advantage of the
following tools:
• Interactive student technology: Includes
23 outstanding Astronomy Interactives,
Animations, links to PowerWeb astronomy
articles, and Constellation Quizzes.
• Text-specific features: Includes Multiple-
Choice Quizzes, Conceptual Questions, and
Application Problems.
• General astronomy features: Includes
Planetarium Activities, Group Activities,
Astronomy Timeline, Universally Speaking,
Astronomy Links Library, Astronomy Picture
of the Day, and Further Readings.
• Additional instructor resources: Includes
Instructor’sManual, PowerPoint Presentation,
and Page Out.
Instructor’s Testing and Resource CD
McGraw-Hill’s EZ Test is a flexible and easy-to-use electronic testing program. The
program allows instructors to create tests from book specific items. It accommodates a
wide range of question types and instructors may add their own questions. Multiple
versions of the test can be created and any test can be exported for use with course
management systems such as WebCT, BlackBoard or PageOut. The program is available
for Windows and Macintosh environments.
Instructor’s Manual
The Instructor’s Manual is found on the Arny Online Learning Center and on the
Instructor’s Testing and Resource CD, and can be accessed only by instructors.
Digital Content Manager
This multimedia collection of visual resources allows instructors to utilize artwork
from the text in multiple formats to create customized classroom presentations,
visually based tests and quizzes, dynamic course website content, or
attractive printed support materials. The digital assets on this cross-platform
CD-ROM are grouped by chapter within easy-to-use folders.
Transparencies
This collection contains 80 overhead transparencies of conceptually based artwork
from Explorations: An Introduction to Astronomy, fourth edition.
NEW! Classroom Performance System and
Questions
The Classroom Performance System (CPS) brings interactivity into the
classroom or lecture hall. CPS is a wireless response system that gives an
instructor immediate feedback from every student in the class. Each CPS
unit comes with up to 512 individual response pads and an appropriate
number of corresponding receiver units. The wireless response pads are
essentially remotes that are easy to use and engage students. The CPS system
allows instructors to create their own questions or use the astronomy
questions provided by McGraw-Hill.
PowerWeb
Harness the assets of the Web to keep your course current with PowerWeb! This online
resource provides high-quality, peer-reviewed content, including up-to-date articles
from leading periodicals and journals, current news, weekly updates with assessment,
interactive exercises, a Web research guide, study tips, and much more! PowerWeb is
available packaged with a McGraw-Hill text or for online purchase from the website
http://www.dushkin.com/powerweb.
How to Study with This Book
Learning anything requires a certain amount of work. You certainly don’t expect to be
able to pick up a guitar and play it without practice, nor do you expect to be able to jog
5 miles without working out regularly. Learning astronomy also requires some work.
The steps below may help you learn the material better and more easily.
In reading any assignment, begin by looking at the pictures. Turn the pages of the
chapter and familiarize yourself with what the objects you will be reading about look
like. Then read the introduction. Next, jump to the summary. Finally, start again and
read the assigned material through. As you read, make notes of things you don’t understand
and ask your instructor or teaching assistant for clarification. For example, if
you are puzzled about why eclipses don’t happen every month, make a note. I would
urge you not to highlight as you read.Making a few short notes is much more effective
than highlighting whole paragraphs.
Look carefully at the pictures and diagrams. If the figure caption has a question in
it, try to answer it.Make your own sketch of diagrams to be sure you understand what
they represent.
In a first reading of a chapter, I’d suggest that if you are troubled by math, you
should simply skip it for the time being. Be sure, however, to read the material leading
into the math so you at least understand the basic idea.When you encounter a mathematical
expression of a physical law, express the law in words. For example, the law of
gravity relates the force of gravity to the mass of the objects and their distance from
each other.
If you encounter words or terms as you read that you don’t know, look them up in
the glossary, the index, or a dictionary or encyclopedia. You are just wasting your time
if you read a description of some object and you don’t know what it is.
When you finish the assignment, try to answer the review questions. They are short
and are designed to show you whether you have assimilated the basic factual material of the assignment. Try to do this without looking back into the chapter, but if you can’t
remember, look it up rather than skip over the question. You might find it helpful to
write out short answers to the questions.
Having read the material once, go back and try to work through the math parts.
Then try a practice problem to see if you can work through the material on your own.
If you get stuck at any point, see your teaching assistant or professor for help. Don’t
be shy about asking questions. Iwish someone had mademeunderstand thiswhen I was
a student. Learning is a thousand times easier if you ask questions when you get stuck.
Seeing a clear night sky spangled with stars is for me a nearly religious experience.
And yet the beauty that I see and my sense of wonder are enriched even more by an appreciation
of the complex processes that make the Universe work. I hope this book will
similarly increase your appreciation of our Universe’s wonders.
If while using this book you find mistakes or if you have suggestions about how to
make it better, please let me know.Write me at P.O. Box 545, Patagonia, AZ, 85624 or
e-mail me at tarny @theriver.com. I really want your feedback.
To obtain an instructor login for this Online Learning Center, ask your local sales representative.
If you're an instructor thinking about adopting this textbook, request a free copy for review.
2006 McGraw-Hill Higher Education