NOPR Collection:

Film-centric promotion of scientific temper: A study of screening grassroots technological innovation short science films at schools across India

2021-06-25T08:07:01Z

Title: Film-centric promotion of scientific temper: A study of screening grassroots technological innovation short science films at schools across India Authors: Rahman, M; Anu; Kumari, N K Prasanna Abstract: Film-centric promotion of scientific temper has been attempted the world over to influence audience perception of themes allied to science and technology which often reflect shades of social as well a cultural concern. This paper attempts to see how students in 77 under-resourced schools in 15 states of India have comprehended the science content through screenings of short science films themed on grassroots technological innovators who have had no formal technical education and yet have been able to innovate products that answered a sorely and regularly felt local need. All the short science films screened offered an amazingly simple technical solution to a real-life challenge. In a large number of instances, the challenges faced by the grassroots innovators in their daily lives were also the problems encountered by the school children who formed the audience of these films. The fact of audience identification with the films emanating from a striking similarity with the socio-economic background of the grassroots technological innovators drove a large part of this study. The analysis establishes how gender distribution of audience among nine to eighteen years of age have received the short science films and what competing ratios did the responses indicate about the degree of engagement during post-screening interactions in both rural as well as urban locations. Page(s): 8-20

Visualizing museums through the visitors’ eye: An n-gram model-based text analysis approach

2021-06-25T06:55:39Z

Title: Visualizing museums through the visitors’ eye: An n-gram model-based text analysis approach Authors: Ghosh, Shatadal; Bagchi, Manash; Gangopadhyay, Jayant; Dasgupta, Nataraj; Kumar, Anurag Abstract: All over the world Museums are developing a Customer Service mindset characteristic of large businesses. Part of this shift can be seen in the rapid adoption of museum visitor surveys that gather feedback about a visitor’s experience in relation to their demographic characteristics — such as likes, dislikes, etc. as per their age, gender and income. The concept of listening to the visitor through such census data collection is not new, it was there from the very beginning, but in certain aspects, it appears to be deficient. For example, it becomes arduous and difficult to identify if the visitors find the place “memorable”. Did they feel “welcome” from the beginning? Do they think “science” is given a due share in that science museum? Can we build an at-a-glance graphical representation of the museum’s image in the visitor’s mental map?
Census type data collection is very manpower intensive and is often biased as the visitors feel righteous to answer the questionnaire more “correctly” than “frankly”. They are not generally considered “easy in-person survey tools”. In this paper, we will discuss a very new way of listening to the visitors and reconstructing their free and fair post-visit overall mental map of the museum. In this new effort, we have tried to construct an automated AI-based word-cloud image from visitors’ feedback offered voluntarily in social networks like, say, in Google review. This image is helpful in summarizing and analysing a large amount of feedback data on a single page by focusing on the keywords and phrases adopted by the visitor in describing her experience. This approach is especially useful for centralized analysis of feedback data on museums having a large number of branches.
Hence, we have applied this method to process feedback on the National Council of Science Museums, the largest body of science museums in India managing twenty-five centres all over the country. For the very first time applying this method, we have been able to visualize our museums through the visitor’s eye rendering the analytic result in the form of a word-cloud that reflects what the visitors fancy most when they recall the museum experience after the visit. Page(s): 21-32

Hands-on exploration of Tessellation and Fractal Mapping on a Tiling Wall to enhance interest in doing Maths in non-formal settings

2021-06-25T06:49:33Z

Title: Hands-on exploration of Tessellation and Fractal Mapping on a Tiling Wall to enhance interest in doing Maths in non-formal settings Authors: Ghose, Aditi Abstract: Aiming to achieve the objectives of the National Innovation Council in a learner-centric manner, the Birla Industrial & Technological Museum has been striving to incorporate interactive learning tools to reinforce its science communication wing. In its latest attempt, the impetus generated by using a Tiling Wall – both to teach the mathematics of recursive algorithm, fractal generation and tessellation along with a means of learning about the learners are explored. It is a case study highlighting the use of a Tiling Wall to illustrate mathematical algorithms like Fractal Generation and Tessellation, along with being a means of studying the participant’s confidence parameter. The lessons are described in detail and so are the analyzed feedbacks received from the learners as well as their parents. The article interprets the purport of employing a Tiling Wall to foster the teaching-learning cycle. Page(s): 33-60

Mobile Science Exhibition: An Impact Assessment Study

2021-06-25T06:47:17Z

Title: Mobile Science Exhibition: An Impact Assessment Study Authors: Grover, Rajesh; Batish, Sheeraj; Brar, Loveleen Abstract: The Mobile Science Exhibition launched by the Pushpa Gujral Science City (PGSC), Kapurthala takes science to the doorsteps of the rural population and impresses upon them the significance of Science and Technology for betterment of the quality of their lives and exposes them to some of the issues and challenges related to sustainable development. The broad components of the exhibition are health education, genetic determination of sex of the offspring, energy education and awareness, waste management, water management and environment education.
A study was conducted to assess the impact of the Mobile Science Exhibition on the scientific awareness related to key issues like health, sanitation, environment and society among the rural children. The overall impact of MSE was also assessed and analysed before and after their visit. An important mechanism to reach out to the unreached and develop a knowledge-driven society, the exhibition enriched the knowledge and skills of the students in various areas of science and technology which is likely to have societal impact and is essential for ensuring sustainable development. Mobile Science Exhibition proved to be a vital and powerful media for popularisation of science creating a scientific temper across the state. Page(s): 61-76