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Teachers' Guide to the Cosmic Times Articles

This teachers' guide is organized by Cosmic Times year, so that each issue has it's own set of web pages. Within the pages for each issue, you will find the following:

• Background on that issue of Cosmic Times
  We include a little background on each issue of Cosmic Times; specifically, why we chose that year to "publish" and how that issue advances the story of our changing understanding of the expanding Universe. Also, we include the age and size of the Universe,as understood by scientists during the year of "publication" of that Cosmic Times issue.
• Summaries of the articles and lessons for that issue
  We provide tables showing each of the articles and lessons included with that Cosmic Time issue and a one-line summary of each.
• Notes on that issue's articles
  We have included notes for each of the articles that appear in the Cosmic Times. These notes include additional background on the science content in the article, additional images and links that may help you and your students understand the content of the article, and/or historical context.
• Downloads
  There is a download page listing all of the downloads for that particular issue.
  • Classroom Lessons – Each poster has 4-5 associated classroom lessons written specifically to tie into the science and/or historical content of that Cosmic Times issue. The lessons ranging from middle- to high-school level, and each poster includes at least one multi-disciplinary lesson.
  • Newsletters – Each poster is accompanied by three newsletter versions, each having text written at different reading levels. These newsletters are designed to be printed on 8.5 × 11" paper, for easy distribution in the classroom. The three levels of text are denoted by an "Edition" type, as described below.
    • Early Edition – text aimed at 7-8 grade readers
    • Home Edition – text aimed at 9-10 grade readers (and the same text that appears in the online edition of the Cosmic Times)
    • Late Edition – text aimed at 11-12 grade readers (and the same text that appears on the posters themselves)
  • Glossaries and Questions – We have also created a glossary for each poster, as well as a list of questions for understanding.

Use the links in the menu bar above, or click a poster below, to navigate to one of the Cosmic Times issues.

1919 A solar eclipse confirms that Einstein's theory of gravity, not Newton's, correctly predicts the bending of starlight.	1929 Hubble builds on his earlier discovery that the Milky Way Galaxy is but one of many galaxies in our Universe to find that the Universe is expanding.	1955 The debate rages between whether the Big Bang and Steady State correctly describes the origin of the universe.
1965 Penzias and Wilson discover the Cosmic Microwave Background, the remnant radiation from the very early Universe, which makes the Big Bang the lead theory for the origin of the Universe.	1993 The COBE mission measures fluctuations in the Cosmic Microwave Background, which explain where structure in our Universe comes from and confirming the role of inflation in the early universe.	2006 The supernova distance scale leads to the discovery of dark energy, a puzzling new component of our Universe that had been undetected until 1997, and its the nature remains a mystery in 2006.