Enthusing the young.

[cotterless45]

The granddaughters were over this evening. We watched a very high and bright pass of the ISS. Youngest, coming up to 5 and seeing it for the first time was full of questions. " is it far away and fast ?","do they have a house as well?", " round the world isn't far for us, but it is for them".

We all waved for Tim Peake and the crew. We had a look at Gemini and Orion's Belt.  

Some simple views and ideas, such seeds can be planted !

clear skies, hopefully !

Nick.

[Cheviot]

First view of the space station for my six year old tonight as well. So many questions at that age...

[FenlandPaul]

Well done, Nick.  The space station and Tim is such a great opportunity to get kids thinking about the night sky.  A few weeks ago (just after Tim's space walk) I did a session with the local beaver scouts and they were hooked on every word, simply because it was about space (i.e. nothing to do with my cringeworthy dad-jokes).  Afterwards they came outside and looked through the AR127L (a "proper" scope) at the moon.  Well, a third of them looked at the moon and two thirds looked at clouds.  It was such a thrill to hear shouts of "that's so cool" and "amazing".  I also told them that if they flew to Mercury they could hvae 3 extra birthdays a year, which they seemed to like.

Paul

[laudropb]

It's a great thrill to get youngsters out looking at the sky. My grandson had his first look recently. I must admit he preferred scanning the sky with bins. Some of his questions were quite amazing. Why are some stars different colours? Why are some brighter than others? And so on. I gave him a pair of 8x32s away with him. Now he has become a real stargazer, always complaining of cloudy skies lol.

[Jonk]

My 5 year old nephew asks if I'm at home with my telescope every time he sees stars or the moon.

He's never seen my telescopes!

Maybe I shouldn't tell him to look up every time it's clear.....nah, I'll keep doing it!

Even my girlfriend is doing the current online Orion course...

[Size9Hex]

Great stuff! I'm reluctant to show the kids the ISS in case they twig that it looks exactly like the sleigh that we watch go over every Christmas Eve...

My daughter pointed up past the streetlight straight at the Pleiades a last month and shouted "Look, lots of stars all together!". I asked how many she could see. "Errrm, seven!". I could only have spotted seven like that after an hour at a dark site. Impressed, proud and annoyed in equal measure!

[Bino Pete]

It's not just the young, I showed my wife the ISS last night as well for the first time and later that night she came outside and took an interest by looking through my scope! 

[Bino Pete]

I took my then 8 year old daughter to see Sir Patrick Moore a few years back while he was giving a talk on 'A Trip to Mars'. 10 years later, we still enjoy talking about it and she's the first one who wants to have a look through my bino's.