The awe of the night sky

Watch the Hartiverse night sky video here: https://youtu.be/5d6N0Yx-qz0
Learn how to share the awe and mystery of the night sky with your kids. For additional resources, check out these Amazon affiliate links:
2021 Night Sky Almanac: A Month-by-Month Guide to North America’s Skies from the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada (Guide to the Night Sky)
Celestron – SkyMaster Giant 15×70 Binoculars – Top Rated Astronomy Binoculars – Binoculars for Stargazing and Long Distance Viewing – Includes Tripod Adapter and Case
Astronomy For Dummies
Celestron – 70mm Travel Scope – Portable Refractor Telescope – Fully-Coated Glass Optics – Ideal Telescope for Beginners – BONUS Astronomy Software Package
50 Things To See With A Telescope – Kids: A Constellation Focused Approach

No matter how far along you are in your sophistication as an amateur astronomer, there is always one fundamental moment that we all go back to. That is that very first moment that we went out where you could really see the cosmos well and you took in the night sky. For city dwellers, this is a revelation as profound as finding aliens living among us. Most of us have no idea the vast panorama of lights that dot a clear night sky when there are no city lights to interfere with the view.

Harken back to that buried memory as a child when, for the very first time you saw the fully displayed clear night sky with all the amazing constellations, meteors and comets moving about. Dots of light far too numerous to ever count.

The best way to recapture the wonder of that moment is to host a star party during the new moon when the sky is darkest. Take your family and go out in the country so you can be there at that moment when they gaze up and say that very powerful word that is the only one that can summarize the feelings they are having viewing the true magnificence of a starry night for the first time. That word is: “Wow!” For extra pizazz, bring a pair of astronomy binoculars or a telescope and focus on some beautiful nebulae or any of the planets, depending on what’s in the sky that night. Saturn is always a crowd pleaser, with its colorful rings so easily seen with the cheapest of optics.

Probably the most phenomenal fact about what your kids are looking at that is also the thing that is most difficult for them to grasp is the sheer enormity of what is above them and what it represents. The very fact that almost certainly, virtually every dot up there in the sky is another star or celestial body that is vastly larger than Earth itself, not by twice or ten times but by factors of hundreds and thousands. It can be a mind-blowing idea to kids. Children have enough trouble imagining the size of the Earth itself, much less something on such a grand scale as outer space. But to see it in person gives them a new appreciation for pictures of stars and planets in books.

When it comes to astronomy, we do better when we fall into deeper and deeper levels of awe at what we see up there in the night sky. Some amazing facts about what your children are looking at can add to the goose bumps they are already having as they gaze eyes skyward. Here are just a few.

Our sun is part of a huge galaxy called the Milky Way that consists of one hundred billion stars just like it or larger. Show them that one hundred billion is 100,000,000,000 and you will see some jaws drop for sure. That’s a big number!
The Milky Way is just one of tens of billions of galaxies, each of which has billions of stars in them as well. In fact, the Milky Way is actually one of the smaller galaxies. Some make us look very small indeed!
If you wanted to drive across the Milky Way, it would take you 100,000 years. But you can’t get there driving the speed limit. You have to drive five trillion, eight hundred million miles per year to get all the way across that fast.
Scientists calculate that the Milky Way is 14 billion years old. That’s 10 billion years older than the calculated age of the Earth itself.

These fun facts should get a pretty spirited discussion going about the origins of the universe and about the possibility of interstellar travel or if there are lifeforms like us on other planets. The odds are forever in your favor that aliens exist. Challenge your kids to calculate that if every star in the Milky Way supported nine planets and if only one of them was habitable like Earth is, how many human-habitable planets would that be? Help them with the math and enjoy some genuine excitement when they see those massive numbers. The results are staggering. It’s not a matter if there is life out there. They are there. We are not alone. They don’t have to prance around on the White House lawn. The numbers prove it.

Let the discussion be fun, exciting, and full of questions. Let their imaginations run free, as this is the birth of a lifelong love of astronomy that they are experiencing. Being there in that first moment when they first see the glorious tapestry of the night sky will cause you to wax nostalgic for your own great moment of astronomical awakening when you were a child. And who knows? It might set off a whole new excitement about astronomy in you all over again.

Thanks for watching this short presentation. Like and subscribe. All the good stuff. Until next time, keep looking up…