| One of the most valuable aspects
of the KidSat and EarthKAM programs has been the effective way in which they allow
teachers and students to utilize technology skills in an educational setting. Instruction
on the use of the Internet and digital cameras serves as a useful method to teach
fundamental technology skills. Previous participants have acquired the skills to
qualitatively identify, annotate and interpret natural color images of the Earth from
space. The KidSat and EarthKAM programs have only used natural color (red, green, blue)
images while the GeoCam mission did take a single infrared band as well. Unfortunately,
camera orientation limited the usefulness of the GeoCam photographic infrared images. So
far multispectral, infrared and false color imagery has not been fully utilized in an
educational setting. Its use will make information gathered by remote sensing a more
valuable tool that will enhance and enrich the Earth Science curriculum. The GeoCam II
multispectral approach will serve as an ideal instrument to address this need since the
selection of spectral bands and digital image processing lie at the very heart of the
technique. The inclusion of a separate natural color CCD will provide a more familiar
image to users who are not yet advanced enough to take full advantage of the system’s
capability. These separate true color images will also provide useful reference and
catalog images. They will be suitable images to compare to previous KidSat and EarthKAM
images which share a similar scale. They will also be useful for comparison to the huge
pre-existing library of Space Shuttle handheld pictures that are taken on every flight. |
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