SOS Network evaluations and best practices

Resources on best practices for creating content and presenting on a spherical display.

Content for spheres

Content for spherical display systems is available for download from the SOS Dataset Catalog.

The SOS Users Collaborative Network helps to support the creation of content for spherical display systems. Many members of the network are involved in creating content.

Guidelines for creating content based on the recommendations of the network have been established and refined at network workshops.

Members of the SOS Ocean-Atmosphere Literacy Partnership project (American Museum of Natural History, Science Museum of Minnesota, and the Maryland Science Center) also created a Best Practices Report for creating content pieces.

NOAA’s suggested content guidelines

The SOS Users Collaborative Network has developed guidelines for creating effective content for spherical display systems. Effective educational content should:

Be structured to tell a compelling Earth system science story that is related o NOAA’s mission. The story should explain an Earth system phenomenon and provide the context and relevance of this phenomenon to the general public.
Have clear messages and learning objectives that will be evaluated.
Be based on an appropriate combination of data visualizations, animations, video and still imagery, and computer graphics.
Feature use of NOAA data (can be complemented by other, non-NOAA datasets). Examples of current visualizations involving NOAA data can be found at the Science On a Sphere Dataset catalog and the NOAA Environmental Visualization Laboratory.
Be able to be displayed on spherical display system, including NOAA’s Science On a Sphere (SOS) System.
Be of a minimum resolution of 2048 X 1024 pixels for all sphere content.
Have planetary images plotted on an equatorial cylindrical equidistant projection for all sphere content.
Be made available as an MPEG-4 file, and/or as a directory of JPEG images with accompanying MP3 file for all sphere content.
Be evaluated for efficacy at delivering environmental messages after fully developed.

Network-level evaluation

A summative evaluation was conducted of 16 sphere sites to investigate the nature and range of impacts that the sphere has on audiences who interact with it. The final report of this evaluation (completed in September 2010), conducted by the Institute for Learning Innovation, is available below.

SOS Network

Cross-site Summative Evaluation

University of Wisconsin - Madison

EarthNow Usage and Awareness Study

Visualizing Change Project: Training and Tools to Support Informal Educators

Summative Evaluation

Institutional-level evaluation

Individual institutions that have spherical display systems have conducted evaluations and have shared them. If you would like to add or update an evaluation report, please contact sos.workshop@noaa.gov.

Thanks to all who have shared their evaluation reports and thereby helped to increase our collective understanding of how this technology can best be utilized.

American Museum of Natural History

Ocean‐Atmosphere Literacy Partnership Summative Evaluation

Aquarium of the Pacific

Evaluation of Professional Development program for SOS Interpreters, 2016

Ocean Science Center Remedial Evaluation

Ocean Science Center Final Evaluation Report

Boonshoft Museum of Discovery

Remedial Evaluation of the SOS exhibition

Bishop Museum

Draft evaluation of two educational programs

Denver Museum of Nature and Science

Summative Evaluation of SOS Programs, December 2013