The day begins as usual. It is just another Physics class. The teacher enters and calls the students attention, as always. But today is different - there is a thrill in the air. The excitement is growing and it seems impossible to discipline the students. They are going to observe for the first time. They will use Faulkes Telescope North to observe the field around a known O star. If they are lucky they will find a cluster of stars in their images.

This is part of project being developed in their school with the help of their teacher. Leonor Cabral, a High School teacher in Cascais (Portugal) wanted to change the way she interacted with the students.  Change their expectations towards science, provide them with an interesting challenge, while developing in the students some important new skills. Key skills that may be useful in any career they might choose for their future. The theme is broad enough to engulf tasks, highly based on ICT (information and communication technology), useful in many different fields of expertise, especially interesting when applied in science teaching/learning.

The project is mentored by a professional astronomer, Dr. André Moitinho (Instituto Dom Luís/ University of Lisbon) and developed by NUCLIO (Núcleo Interactivo de Astronomia), a non-profit association of professional and amateurs astronomers devoted to public outreach and education. 

André thinks that O stars, young high mass stars, still live in the cluster where they first appeared. After scrutinizing an O star catalogue and picking their candidate, the students started to select candidate fields around the O star. The fields will now be observed using the Faulkes Telescope North. Leonor knows perfectly well that this is a privilege, not mundane to the classroom ambience. The students are maybe not so aware of their luck but their excitement makes us sure that this is the way to do it!