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What would you advise for "introducing" young visitors to the night sky. We have a retirement ranch in West Texas. Clear skies most of the time. We're 2 miles from the nearest neighbor, so no light pollution.We frequently have guests with kids of all ages and I keep remembering the first time our  daughter saw  the horsehead nebula at a starwatching party. I would really like to afford that sort of opportunity to visitors and kids. I have a Meade etx-125, but the mirror fell out and the drive quit shortly after we bought it. It works fine, manually, with the offset eyepiece. I've decided after much reading that it isn't worth repairs. It makes a great spotting scope for watching birds and deer out the front windows and so there it sits. (And, yes, many kids had access to it before the calamities. I have learned that lesson.)

My thinking is to perhaps buy something like the etx-90 with the autostar feature, assuming it would help us find things to look at within the constraints of young peoples' attention spans. Then use the old 125 to look at them bigger. But my experience with the mechanical misfortunes of the 125 make me hesitate. I wouldn't mind spending a couple of thousand dollars if it better fit the objective. 

Any advice? 

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200p dobsonian would be the right size and good value, but if you are going to show kids something, you need tracking. So that means a tracking or goto dob. You will need something for the kids to stand on. And cheap , easy-to-use eyepieces. I like to use my BSTs for kids since they are cheaper than the better ones, but they are really easy to watch through and have pretty good image quality.Also the twist-up eyecups make little fingers work harder before they actually touch the eyelens. 

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   I never had the chance to do a demonstration with a scope, bins, etc. for a group of youngsters so can only make a suggestion or two.

   The first object to observe that would awe kids would be the Moon if it's up.

   Then try for some of the brighter planets like Jupiter, Saturn or maybe Venus if out.

   If all goes well with their attention still intact, you can show them some open clusters like the Pleadies or the double cluster in Perseus. If still attentive, try some views of the Milky Way star clouds.

   But keep in mind, these kids will want to see the "WOW" objects first otherwise boredom will set in fast and they will loose interest fast. If you do take on the challenge, let us know how the activity went.

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Hi and welcome to SGL.

Depends on just how young the visitors are.  At my club's public events, very young children ( brought along by adults of course ) you need a bright object like the moon or Jupiter. Anything much dimmer and you'll get comments like "there's nothing there ".

Older children and adults can appreciate dimmer objects.  In all cases, a brief description of the object on view is needed - what it is / how far / at the very least.

A telescope with a drive helps (like the ETX).   Although I use a manual Dob, it's not ideal, especially for higher powers.

Make sure that visitors can reach the eyepiece.  If steps are used, get an adult to support a child  ( not yourself, but whoever brought them )

Good luck  :smiley:  Ed.

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Hi Steve,

Welcome to the forums. We have a very small ranch in California and a retirement home here in the UK ;

not a good trade off for Astronomy, lol.  If you know your way around the sky and live without go-to, I would suggest looking for a good " preowned " standard Questar, and forget about mechanical misfortunes. The telescope has been in continuous manufactured for over 50 years with very little change. The optics are second to none, and It would be a couple of grand (+ or -) very well spent.

There's some good information here .......  http://www.questar-corp.com

post-21902-0-45850900-1391537364_thumb.j

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You may wish to consider Celestron CPC series of scopes, very easy to setup with good optics.  Celestron have a selection ranging from the CPC 800 to the CPC 1100, I owned the CPC 800 and can confirm it served me exceptionally well, comes with GPS and easy star alignment.

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Thanks, folks. Another question: What I'd like to do is suggest a "homework" program for parents to take their kids through before they come. I've looked around the WWW quite a bit but failed to find anything I think would really ignite the curiosity of a, say, 6 or 7 year old. As a for instance, a cousin's family is coming for a week in May. His four kids have 10 kids ranging from diapers to early teens. I'm sure that if the parents would take the time to homework the kids so they might--might--want to do something besides Wii and xBox. Books, videos, websites?

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Had a look for an online beginners guide to astronomy, most were about not buying a telescope at first........maybe a more in depth search could find something suitable.

If the guests are coming in May, and want to observe the night sky, perhaps consider what time it gets dark in Texas, could be past the smaller children's bedtime.

I'd make sure they bring suitable clothing that's ok for Texas in May.

Hope it works out, could be very rewarding, Ed.

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I hadn't considered solar, Red Dwarf. Don't know much about it. (and by "much" I mean I do know nothing) Can a filter solve that, or would it take a dedicated scope? As to bedtimes, Brown Dwarf, they usually get thrown out around here. Parents are generally trying to get them to sleep late. You're sure right on the dearth of good stuff aimed at whetting kids' appetites.

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Have you considered solar?

Now why didn't I think of that  :smiley:

Solves a lot of problems, like bedtime for the little ones.

Solar observing needs caution, never point any telescope or binoculars at the Sun, unless it is constructed or adapted for that specific purpose.

You can buy or make a solar filter to fit most telescopes, Baader Astrosolar is very popular in the UK, for viewing Sunspots. Make absolutely certain the filter covers the whole of the front aperture and cannot become dislodged. Never leave children alone for solar observing.

To see prominences etc, a hydrogen alpha solar telescope is needed, Lunt Solar Systems and Coronado are two manufacturers.

Regards, Ed.

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I never had the chance to do a demonstration with a scope, bins, etc. for a group of youngsters so can only make a suggestion or two.

 

   The first object to observe that would awe kids would be the Moon if it's up.

 

   Then try for some of the brighter planets like Jupiter, Saturn or maybe Venus if out.

 

   If all goes well with their attention still intact, you can show them some open clusters like the Pleadies or the double cluster in Perseus. If still attentive, try some views of the Milky Way star clouds.

 

   But keep in mind, these kids will want to see the "WOW" objects first otherwise boredom will set in fast and they will loose interest fast. If you do take on the challenge, let us know how the activity went.

I have done lots of demonstrations for young children and most of the time my experience is the opposite. Show them the moon and often anything else you show them will be humdrum. Also if you can tell a story anything and everything is a good target. While showing two 5th grade school classes the sky I had to change my third target (after Jupiter and the Moon) from the Orion nebula (presented as a huge starforming gas cloud) to Betelgeuse (a red giant star that will explode as a SN) due to thin clouds. Betelgeuse turned out to be much more popular (clusters and double stars with colour differences are also surprisingly popular). It is also very important that you ask children what they have seen and also tell them what to look for. Many children (and some adults) might not find the view in eyepiece and not say anaything, others might overlook "obvious features".

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Thanks, folks. Another question: What I'd like to do is suggest a "homework" program for parents to take their kids through before they come. I've looked around the WWW quite a bit but failed to find anything I think would really ignite the curiosity of a, say, 6 or 7 year old. As a for instance, a cousin's family is coming for a week in May. His four kids have 10 kids ranging from diapers to early teens. I'm sure that if the parents would take the time to homework the kids so they might--might--want to do something besides Wii and xBox. Books, videos, websites?

The idea of homework is a good one but I unfortunately don't have any good suggestions. However I suggest postwork. If you have shown something distinct (Moon, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Venus and some DSOs) asking the children to draw it can be an amazingly good activity.

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I have done lots of demonstrations for young children and most of the time my experience is the opposite. Show them the moon and often anything else you show them will be humdrum. Also if you can tell a story anything and everything is a good target. While showing two 5th grade school classes the sky I had to change my third target (after Jupiter and the Moon) from the Orion nebula (presented as a huge starforming gas cloud) to Betelgeuse (a red giant star that will explode as a SN) due to thin clouds. Betelgeuse turned out to be much more popular (clusters and double stars with colour differences are also surprisingly popular). It is also very important that you ask children what they have seen and also tell them what to look for. Many children (and some adults) might not find the view in eyepiece and not say anaything, others might overlook "obvious features".

   But wouldn't that quickly elliminate those kids not really that interested and leave more time (observing) with those that do have more interest? I guess both ways would work?

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But wouldn't that quickly elliminate those kids not really that interested and leave more time (observing) with those that do have more interest? I guess both ways would work?

It's not about interest but being able to find the spot that alowns you to look through the telescope. Many children won't speak up even if they don't see anything.

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And if you ask "do you see a flying dinosaur up there" most kids will say "yes".With my own kids , I ask what they see in a roundabout way , so as not to pollute their mind with a certain image. "do you see something now?" "what do you see?" "do you see something in the top belt?". My younger kid is too young to actually "observe" it seems to me that age 4-5 is the level when they start actually getting the hang of looking through anything optical. Younger kid at 2.5 years seems to be able to actually look at the moon and maybe the jupiter on a small scope. The older at 5.5 is able to actually look at jupiter, m42 etc.  

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And if you ask "do you see a flying dinosaur up there" most kids will say "yes".With my own kids , I ask what they see in a roundabout way , so as not to pollute their mind with a certain image. "do you see something now?" "what do you see?" "do you see something in the top belt?".

For that reason my my preferred method is to coach the viewer just like you but with larger groups you often don't have the time (I want all visitors view 2-3 objects before the cold sets in) and everyone left in the cue will have heard the entire conversation.

My younger kid is too young to actually "observe" it seems to me that age 4-5 is the level when they start actually getting the hang of looking through anything optical. Younger kid at 2.5 years seems to be able to actually look at the moon and maybe the jupiter on a small scope. The older at 5.5 is able to actually look at jupiter, m42 etc.

That agrees with my experiences. I schedule all demonstrations for school classes for dates where a showcase planet and the moon is visible unless the children are at least 13 years old and the teacher wants to focus on DSOs. As an aside the youngest to have looked thought the Uppsala 36 cm double refractor during a public demonstration was IIRC 9 months and the oldest was above 90 (her father was a astronomer at the observatory in the early 1900s).

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