Observatory
The resources at the Mt...
Links
The resources at the Mt. Wilson Observatory facilitate student learning of the constellations. As students (grades 4-12) progress thru a quizgame at the Mt. Wilson site, additional explanations are provided. While the same information could be acquired offline, this site offers three advantages: the constellations are presented in an attractive format, the details are more wide-ranging than other sources on the same topic, and each viewer can request a personal starmap. Considering that this planetarium is "flat", the show is pretty good.CurrentSky, maintained by a teacher in Kansas City MO, is updated monthly to illustrate the monthly shifts in the constellations. A nice gem. Now, if you would prefer a view from the north pole of our Sun for which you can set the controls for time and date and orbit of the planets, link to the Solar System Live at fourmilab.
Interested in viewing Saturn from Mars? or Jupiter from Venus? Space at JPL provides views of planets in our solar system from planets other than Earth. We adults may be long gone but get a glimpse of what future generations will take for granted--from our planet to yours.
The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (sohowww) is appropriate only for very sophisticated students. Daily updates from this observatory will allow them to investigate phenomena alongside scientists.
The Lake Afton Public Observatory's star charts (Kansas) could be compared and contrasted with those at JPL (California)--different views from different states. While much of the information pertains to real shows at this facility, the Web page author has made a special attempt to change the information daily as new discoveries occur. The contributors observe that textbooks and CD's cannot be updated as quickly and easily as telecommunications encourages, especially in astrononomy. An expert network is available through this site also.
The Virtual Observatory's contents change each evening. Puzzlement about the unique features of the earth's moon is featured, too. For the moon anyway every student can visit an observatory.
Jack the Stargazer is completing a successful season on PBS. His site, called naked eye astronomy, will be especially appealing to young students who may not have high-powered telescopes available. The cartoons, such as Bragging Stars, are terrific!
Along comes a virtual telescope at Skyview. The interface can be amateur or professional to view the long radiowaves and high energy traces. This virtual capability is especially level at the K-12 level where the power of real telescopes is limited in range. AAO, also like a virtual telescope, concentrates on depicting the many different kinds of nebulae.
Whyville, a virtual world for ages 8-15, along with Celestron, offers a SkyScout to view 6,000celestial objects, the 12 core constellations.
Gaze at the sun during the day or at night on Sungazer.
Annotation
Especially for students who do not live close to an observatory or a planetarium, these sites introduce them to new sources of research online. Learning the names of the constellations does not receive the same attention as it enjoyed in prior ages and mythology. Making sense of the sky, however, illustrates one use of classification systems as well as understanding of nature's phenonema which has captured human imagination.
