If you want to get from New York to Los Angeles by car, you’d pull out a map. If you want to find the nearest gas station, you’d pull out a smaller map. What if you wanted to find our nearest neighbor outside our solar system? A star chart is a map of the night sky, divided into smaller parts (grids) so you don’t get too overwhelmed. Astronomers use these star charts to locate stars, planets, moons, comets, asteroids, clusters, groups, binary stars, black holes, pulsars, galaxies, planetary nebulae, supernovae, quasars, and more wild things in the intergalactic zoo.
How to find two constellations in the sky tonight, and how to get those constellations down on paper with some degree of accuracy.
Materials
- Dark, cloud-free night
- Two friends
- String
- Rocks
- Pencil