Psalm 19:1 – The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
As a young child I would try hard to look at the stars at night, but living in a large city, that could be difficult sometimes. There was much excitement to be had when preparations for summer camp were made, because I knew I’d be able to star gaze there.
We have purchased so much curriculum this year that I was loathe to buy anything more, but I wanted to supplement a science lesson on the distance between the planets. So after a laborious search on the internet to find some material suitable for Genius, who is 12, I ran across some sites that I would like to share with you.
While most of the information is excerpts from their published books, Answers in Genesis has some awesome pictures on their site, and the previews given are worth reading even if they are not in their entirety.
The American Museum of Natural History has a site called OLogy and one of the sections has “Astronomy Our Place in Space”. There are a lot of hands on activity ideas to do with your children here. I make one disclaimer and that is under their “How Did the Universe Begin” they subscribe to the big bang theory. However I feel that a lot of the activities on this page are useful and fun!
Nasa of course has a couple of sites up for different age groups. For the younger set there is Space Place filled with games and projects, and for the older group there is Imagine the Universe.
I also found a site entitled From Stargazers to Starships also seemingly supported by Nasa, chronicling the history of astronomy. This is also for older children, as it seems to be mostly reading.
Discovery Education (as in the Discovery television channel) has a site with lessons plans ranging from K-12. With a variety of topics listed.
All of these sites with the exception of Answers In Genesis are secular. I was not able to go through all of the different tabs, activities or games on them, but suspect some do not support creation as their theory. That aside, there is a lot of valuable information and education that we can benefit from nonetheless. If like me, you are just looking for a supplement here or there for your current science program that is written from a creation perspective, they can prove to be a lot of fun and keep the kids busy, while (gulp) they are still learning.
If you check out any of the sites above, share in the comments what you or your children thought of them. Do you know of any free websites that you can share with us dealing in astronomy?
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You can hang out with Tammy at Three Different Directions where the countdown to her family vacation is always at the top of her thoughts….
photo by Bill Lile
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