Here are a number of strategies and activities you might use to help uncover student misconceptions, the level of student learning and areas in which students might need further instruction.

The use of graphic organizers can be used as pre-assessment activities (or formative assessments, if we use the results to help us plan!), as embedded assessment strategies and even as final assessment assignments. The most common graphic organizers are the KWL charts and Venn diagrams. The “freeology” website (http://freeology.com/) has a large variety of graphic organizers that are downloadable. This site also provides a very brief explanation of how to use each graphic organizer.

Video Post-Viewing Assessment:

The "Give One; Get One" http://freeology.com/graphicorgs/page6.php summary strategy is a useful tool to identify what the students have retained from the information in the video. Provide the students with a grid of nine squares. In any three squares, the students record three different facts or ideas that they remember from the video. The students then begin to ask their classmates to fill in the other squares with information from the video that has not yet been recorded on the grid. Each classmate can fill in only one square on an individual's grid, but students can add information to as many different grids as they want. The grid can now be used in a variety of ways, such as notes for the students as they write a summary of the information addressed in the video.

Pre-Assessment:

Suggest doing a “Think, Pair, Share” activity with your students. Provide them with a list of terms and astronomers mentioned in the video Astronomy’s Biggest Stars. Have them write a sentence or two on the people and term they know.
List of possible terms and astronomers: Ptolemy, Aristotle, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Kepler, geocentric, heliocentric, elliptical orbit, longitude, latitude, lunar eclipse, crescent moon.

Embedded Assessment:

Have the students keep their “Think, Pair, Share” sheets and take the appropriate notes for each of the terms and astronomers. After you have reviewed the video with your class enter into a class discussion about the history of astronomy. Allow the students to use their fact sheets as a resource.

History of Astronomy Scavenger Hunt - web-based activity developed for 9-12 grades.

This activity provides students with an opportunity to learn the basic facts of the history of astronomy by using the internet. Provides student worksheet and assessment strategies. http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/3122

Post Assessment:

As a final evaluation you could assign a WebQuest type activity:
History of Astronomy and Space Exploration - geared for grade 7
http://www.midlandstech.com/gearup/w2Summer/Webquest.htm

Astronomy Timeline – a WebQuest for 9th grade comprehensive science.
http://www2.yk.psu.edu/~mer7/astronomytimeline.htm

Students could do a presentation on the history of astronomy. The history should include at the very least the astronomers mentioned in the video and provide an explanation of Ptolemy’s geocentric model of the world and Galileo’s ( and Copernicus’) heliocentric view of the world.

The Frayer Model graphic organizer can serve as a final assessment strategy. The Frayer Model has the student define the concept, write some important characteristics, give examples, and give non-examples. A Frayer Model blank template can be found at http://toolsfordifferentiation.pbworks.com/Frayer-Model. A Frayer Model challenges the student to think beyond a simple definition; the student needs to work with the topic at a much deeper level. For episode 7 have the students complete two Frayer Model graphic organizers: one for geocentric and another for heliocentric.