[email protected]

<< Children ask zillions of questions, and yet they'll never ask about
everything. They need to have all sorts of things pointed out to them and
discussed around them so that they have some idea what *can* be asked about.
>>

For example:
<< Mars was easy to spot because it was so

much larger than all the other stars (I know Mars is a planet and not a

star) and it was actually red!>>


I'm not going to wait for my child to discover Mars on his own! My husband
has always been interested in astronomy. He points these things out to us all
the time. His dad did it for him. Nobody's ever forced anyone else to look
up or care, but we've had LOTS of times when other people were over too, and
most or all would go out and let Keith tell them what was cool to see that
night.

We've driven 50 miles to get past clouds to see meteors and moonrises. We've
played with eclipses all kinds of ways.

It would be kind of sadistic not to tell a kid when something cool is going
to happen that won't happen again for years (if ever in his lifetime).

<<Do you have kids? Do your kids think in these deep philosophical ways? >>

That question wasn't to me, but my kids are deep philosophical thinkers AND
comedians, and those two things often come together.

Sandra

Crystal

-=I'm not going to wait for my child to discover Mars on his own! =-

Exactly. I saw something about Mars being close to Earth on a few lists and
I thought it would be interesting so I looked for it. I would not have
known about it if someone didn't post it somewhere. Sure, I could have
looked up on the one day it wasn't cloudy around here and discovered it
myself but I doubt I wouldn't have because I'm not usually out at night.

Crystal

[email protected]

If anyone gets to Maine there is a solar system set up on the main roads
across several towns. Sizes of the planets are shown in human sizes. Heres the
link: http://www.umpi.maine.edu/info/nmms/solar/
Pretty neat.

Laura

<<<-=I'm not going to wait for my child to discover Mars on his own! =-

Exactly. I saw something about Mars being close to Earth on a few lists and
I thought it would be interesting so I looked for it. I would not have
known about it if someone didn't post it somewhere. Sure, I could have
looked up on the one day it wasn't cloudy around here and discovered it
myself but I doubt I wouldn't have because I'm not usually out at night.

Crystal


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]