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This is the Classical Astronomy Update, an email newsletter especially
for Christian homeschool families (though everyone is welcome!)
Please feel free to share this with any interested friends.
IN THIS UPDATE:
- Announcements
- Homeschool Heartbeat Interview -- This Coming Week!
- The 2008 Old Farmer's Almanac
- Learning For Life - Homeschool Quote Book
- Dance of the Planets
- Moon Passes Jupiter and Antares
- Seasonal Skies
- Astronomical Topics
As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that
understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone
out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there
is none that doeth good, no, not one. - Romans 3:10-12
Welcome to the Classical Astronomy Update!
Hello Friends,
Finally! The summer is almost finally over! I know a lot of people just love summer -- the sticky days, the humid nights, sunburn, bugs and all that. For my part, I prefer the cooler weather and the shorter days.
There's nothing like September in Cleveland, Ohio! The days have been golden. The clouds of fall are dramatic and evening arrives before the kid's bedtime. Then it's "good sleeping weather" at night.
I love living in a climate with four seasons. I love watching those leaves fall and those white flakes come down all winter. If you live somewhere way down south and are glad to miss the snow, I'm happy for you -- there's more for me!
These are all signs of the seasons, and for those who have learned to "read" the sky, the changing constellations of evening are just as much "signs" as the change in climate!
Announcements
Homeschool Heartbeat Interview -- This Coming Week!
As mentioned in a previous Update, I'll be on Homeschool Heartbeat with Mike Farris all next week, from Monday, September 17 through Friday, September 21. In case you're not familiar with the program, Homeschool Heartbeat is a two-minute program about homeschooling on Christian radio, sponsored by HSLDA, and heard on over 500 radio stations.
Hope you'll all get to catch the show. I'll be talking about the usual stuff, how Classical Astronomy is a Biblical approach to astronomy, and how it was an important part of education in early America, among other things.
Here's a station listing so you can find a station in your area that carries the program.
The 2008 Old Farmer's Almanac
Another sign of the coming of autumn is that the 216th edition of The Old Farmer's Almanac is finally in stores. This fun little annual publication is the oldest periodical in the United States, having been published continuously each year since 1792. It's a genuine piece of Americana that hearkens back to the generation of our Founding Fathers.
Once upon a time, every home in early America had the following publications: the Bible, Pilgrim's Progress, and an almanack, hanging on a nail in the outhouse. The old almanacks were an early source of American literature, along with humor, recipes, folklore, and of course Classical Astronomy.
Inside The Old Farmer's Almanac you'll find the traditional calendar tables that will give lots of astronomical information for the coming year, including eclipses, the positions of the planets, and other notable events in the night sky.
Of course not many people today appreciate the calendar pages. Someone once asked Judson Hale, the previous editor of the Almanac, why they don't get rid of the calendar pages. Mr. Hale replied that the calendar pages were "the heart and soul of the Almanac," and that "without them it wouldn't be an almanack!" The Almanac also includes a couple excellent astronomy articles by Bob Berman, a respected mainstream astronomy writer.
I'm sorry to report that this edition still includes the obligatory three pages of astrology. Mr. Robert Thomas, who founded the Almanac 216 years ago, would not have approved. In the beginning, The Old Farmer's Almanac did not include any astrology, but this crept in over time. You can do what I do and either ignore these pages, or read them to laugh at the silliness of astrology (i.e. finding the best astrological times to cut your nails or pour concrete.)
You might also be advised that there is a silly article about people who claim to communicate with their dead housepets! Such silly folklore aside, The Old Farmer's Almanac is an otherwise-worthwhile secular publication, but let the buyer beware!
The Almanac made headlines this week with it's predication that 2008 would be the hottest year of the past century. Their prediction technique is quite unique in weather forecasting, being based on the eleven-year cycle of the Sun. They get it right sometimes, but unlike mainstream science, freely admit when they get it wrong. It's fun to read in any case.
Though The Old Farmer's Almanac may be the oldest, Maryland's Hagerstown Town and Country Almanack is slightly younger, "only" being around since 1797. But this one is more authentic to the old Colonial almanacks, though it can only be found in the Mid-Atlantic states.
You can find The Old Farmer's Almanac just about anywhere, on newstands and at supermarkets and drugstores. If you've never done so, give it a look-see.
Learning For Life - A Book of Quotations for Homeschoolers
As some readers might have noticed, I love quotations! I've often used quotes in the Update, and our astronomy curriculum Signs & Seasons is full of quotes, some pages having more than one. It's a joy to read words of wisdom from luminaries of the past and present. I've also found it be a great way to learn history. Why read a book about the conquests of Caesar when you can read Caesar's own books (which are the primary sources for the historical events)?
Now we Christian homeschoolers finally have our own book of quotations: Learning for Life: Educational Words of Wisdom by Teri Ann Berg Olsen. Learning for Life includes almost 3,000 quotations by more than 1,000 people (including a collection of Bible verses) on education and child training -- teaching, learning, and the pursuit of knowledge.
Topic areas span from Education & Instruction and Parents & Parenting to Nature & The Outdoors and Curriculum & Lessons. The quoted individuals range from Socrates to Galileo, famous classic authors and artists, American Founding Fathers, contemporary figures like George and Laura Bush, and homeschool luminaries such as Michael Farris and John Taylor Gatto.
Every homeschool should have a copy of Bartlett's Familiar Quotations and The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. But now we also have Mrs. Olsen's Learning for Life to go alongside on that shelf. I'd encourage everyone to order a copy of this wonderful resource directly from Teri's website.
Dance of the Planets
The Moon Passes Jupiter and Antares
The bright planet Jupiter has been hanging low in the evening sky all summer, near the bright star Antares in the constellation Scorpius. Slow-moving Jupiter remains with its host constellation as it progresses across the sky with the passing months.
If you noticed Jupiter and Antares back in the early summer, you'd have noticed them in the eastern sky, rising shortly after the sunset. But during the current season, Jupiter and Antares have progressed into the western sky with the advance of the seasons. Soon the Sun's apparent motion will bring it near the place of Jupiter and Antares, and these celestial bodies will appear to draw into the sunset and be hidden by the Sun's bright glare.
 Meanwhile, the waxing crescent Moon is back in the evening sky this week, and has begun another cycle of swinging by the visible planets. Keep your eye on the crescent Moon as it draws toward Jupiter and Antares, making its closest pass on Monday and Tuesday evenings, September 17 and 18.
Observers in Australia and New Zealand will be favored to see a very close conjunction of the Moon with Antares on Tuesday evening. It should be a very pretty sight for our friends Down Under, where Scorpius is placed very high above the horizon as compared to the northern hemisphere.
For more information about the motions of the Moon and visible planets, check out Signs & Seasons, our homeschool astronomy curriculum.
Seasonal Skies
The Summer Triangle
One constellation that everyone in North America can see this month is not even a constellation! It's called The Summer Triangle and it is a big triangle formed of the three brightest stars visible overhead in the early evenings after sunset in September. You should be able to see the Summer Triangle on a clear night even from the light-drenched cities. If you look up, you should be able to find two bright stars high overhead and another bright star lower toward the south.
 Looking toward south, the high star to the left is called Deneb and it's the brightest star in the constellation Cygnus, the Swan. This constellation is sometimes called The Northern Cross since the fainter stars form a cross-like shape, with Deneb at the head of the Cross. However, the word "Deneb" means "tail" in Arabic, and this star is supposed to the tail of the swan. If you can see a line of stars extending from Deneb, they might look to you like the neck of a swan.
The high star to the right of Deneb is called Vega and it's the brighteset star in Lyra, the Lyre. The lower star is called Altair and it is the bright star in Aquila, the Eagle. If you are looking from a dark enough site, far from the city lights, you can see that the Milky Way passes through the middle of the Summer Triangle. Try to find these stars and then check them out on a good star map. A good map in found in Sky & Telescope magazine, though you may find something useful at the magazine's website, http://skytonight.com/.
By the way, the Summer Triangle is not a recognized constellation! It's actually what astronomers call an "asterism," since it is a star pattern formed of bright stars from three different constellations.
For more information about the constellations and their annual
our homeschool astronomy curriculum.
Astronomical Topics
An Ohio "Stonehenge"
Over Labor Day weekend, the Ryan family took a drive through Beautiful Ohio to visit the Newark Earthworks. There are a number of mound formations throughout the southern half of Ohio that were made by the Hopewell Indians, also known as the Moundbuilders. Made perhaps 2000 years ago, these mounds are basically huge landscaping formations in which the terrain was sculpted to create shapes. The most famous of the Moundbuilder formations is Serpent Mound in southernmost Ohio.
The Newark complex had once been the largest complex of Hopewell earthworks. Only portions of it remain intact today, most notably a large circle 1200 feet in diameter, and covering about 15 acres. This Great Circle mound has an open end that more or less points in the general direction of the summer solstice.
However, this alignment is not precise. It may be that the centerline of the opening or its sides may point to other places along the horizon, such as a noteworthy moonrise position.
Anyway, the Great Circle is a very neat place -- mostly open in the middle with a few trees for shade, with more trees closer to the circular walls of the mound. It would be a very nice place to have a picnic or community event. It was a beautiful day when we went, and I was struck by the great number and variety of butterflies in the place. We've had a good season for butterflies in Ohio this year, but there seemed to be a remarkable number of them in the Great Circle.
Scholars like to debate about this or that, and speculate as to whether the Great Circle mound was used as a calendar and/or for some sort of religious and community purposes. The fact is, when you're standing there looking at the thing, you can tell that it's anyone's guess why the Moundbuilders made it. They're not here to tell us, and they didn't leave a story behind to explain themselves.
What is very clear however is that the Great Circle mound is a very impressive piece of engineering, especially for a stone age culture that probably did not have a sophisticated mathematics and certainly did not have access to modern earthmoving equipment. This makes the place all the more mysterious -- who were these people and why did they go to so much trouble and effort to make these mounds?
The Great Circle mound area is set aside as a state park. However, most of the remainder of the Newark Earthworks have been destroyed to make room for "progress." A main road straddles the state park with a car dealer across the street. An older middle class neighborhood lies to the north of the circle, with a "Moundbuilders" ice cream stand across from the park. A large complex known as the Octagon is now part of a golf course. It's a shame in my opinion that such unique and irreplacable structures by Pre-Columbian cultures were destroyed decades ago merely for their real estate value.
COMING UP IN FUTURE UPDATES
- Autumn will soon arrive on the northern at the Autumnal Equinox.
- One of these days, we'll write about the differences between the science of astronomy and the pseudoscience of astrology.
Til next time, God bless and clear skies!
-jay
The Ryan Family
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and
the stars, which thou hast ordained, what is man that thou art
mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?
- Psalm 8:3,4, a Psalm of David
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