Astronomy

Day 1: What is Astronomy?

• Watch the video. Write 3 questions about what you see. Carl Sagan is a critical friend to astronomy, who helped popularize it in the last half of the 20th century.

• Spend 25 minutes looking at the presentation that is published. Take notes and be prepared to discuss things you DO and DO NOT understand.
• 
  

• You will be given a copy of skymaps, with a Northern, Equatorial, and Southern projection. On each of them, find
1. The Ecliptic
2. Orion
3. Sagittarius
4. Ursa Major
5. Ursa Minor
6. Casseiopeia
7. Cepheus
8. Draco
9. Polaris
10. Vega
11. Cygnus
12. Bootes

http://vimeo.com/38101676#at=0 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByD5by_PL64

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKXBtWHExwQ

Discuss The night sky from different latitudes

(11)

Big Dipper Stars

This information comes from my World Almanac. The distance to the main stars of the Big Dipper ranges from about 68 light-years (ly) to about 210 light-years, as shown here: 

 210 ly -- > *     * < -- 88 ly

                      * < -- 68 ly

                          *          * < -- 105 ly


                90 ly -- > *        * < -- 78 ly

Most of these stars do actually belong to a single open star cluster (I don't think the 210 ly one belongs, though). The stars of a given constellation need not have any physical relationship to each other. They may be vast distances apart; we simply associate them because they happen to be in the same general direction, from our viewpoint.