The Tech Savvy Teacher

Have you ever wanted to go with your class to look at the stars or phases of the moon? Sadly most classes are restricted by what they can see in space because school takes place during the day. However, with Stellarium, a free program that allows you to look at the night sky at any time, any day, and any place, you can bring space right into the classroom!

I used Stellarium to teach about the phases of the moon. This program is especially great because you can see the moon no matter what the weather is outside. To begin we set up Stellarium to best show the moon. First we picked our location, second we set the time and date, third we found the moon and locked on to it, and fourth we sized the moon. We could then zoom in and look at the moon to see it's phase.

We were able to use this program to collect data and draw out the phases of the moon. It allows the children to predict and analyze how the phases change and how the moon changes position in the sky due to the earth's rotation and it's orbit. We could not have done this in the classroom without technology such as this. Even if the students were required to do this at home many factors prohibit them such as weather, location, and bed time. This program even lets you speed up time to watch the moon travel across the sky without having to stand and watch for countless hours.


This program is great to use with any lesson about space: planets, moon, star, galaxy, orbits, etc. With programs like this in the hands of a tech savvy teacher students will benefit greatly from increased observation and experimentation.