Have you been thinking to teach astronomy for your children? Why not? Astronomy can be a very good hobby for the whole family. It can be a great way to spend time together and share interesting knowledge. Astronomy can also teach children the basics of how to think and analyze abstract issues. Now the question is how to teach astronomy to children? When the children are young, they easily get unmotivated if the information is too difficult. Teenagers can keep themselves motivated longer, but again, it should not be too difficult or boring. So, how to teach them? How to motivate and inspire your children to learn astronomy? This article provides some basic tips for teaching astronomy to children.

Children are fascinated of space and can easily get interested in astronomy. For example, if children see a BBC space document in television, they easily get hooked because the BBC documents are usually so well done and the “space stuff is cool”. Now, most probably you cannot provide a similar experience. What would be a good strategy for your children to get interested to learn more about astronomy?

Let’s think about the process first. What should be thought and in which order? It could go like this:
1.    Start from the solar system and planets. Find out what the planets look like and how they are formed.
2.    Extend the scope and discuss about the universe. Start by describing the Milky Way in which our solar system belongs to. Next continue to galaxies and nebulae, as well as black holes.
3.    Continue to discuss more about stars, such as the Sun. Extend the topic to cover the evolution of a star, temperature, size, etc.
4.    Cover even more topics such as constellations, groups of galaxies, groups of black holes
5.    Discuss about astronomy research. Talk about the history of astronomy, telescopes, astronomy photographing, space flights, etc.

Now that was one process, but which would be good tactics and techniques? First of all, discussing (teaching) with pictures is a great start, but some other tactics could help to learn faster. There are various books for children to learn astronomy. There are also various DVD’s and computer software, as well as games to help learning astronomy. You can even buy astronomy stickers for your children.

One good tactic in teaching astronomy to children is to concentrate into one object, such as the Moon, at the time and look at a picture of the object together. At the same time you describe the details of the object and answer those millions of questions. As soon as the basics are done, take your child with you and go skywatching together. Let your child view the objects such as the Moon with binoculars and low magnification telescope. After viewing the target, ask your child which he/she would like to see next. Let your child spot new objects because they get a huge motivation burst every time they succeed in finding a target.

So don’t continue alone anymore. Take your child together with you and start a new different way to spent time together. Any questions or ideas in your mind? Please drop a comment, I am eager to hear. If you liked this post, you might consider subscribing to my RSS feed or email newsletter in the top right corner of this blog. By that you can get the updates to your favourite RSS reader of directly to your email.