Nico’s favorite astronomy movies on the Internet!
Q: What do the Oort Cloud, the Kuiper Belt, and the dwarf-planet Sedna have in common with the accretion disc and event horizon of a black hole?
A: They’re all things that I first learned about through my 7-year-old son’s hobby of watching astronomy movies on the Internet.
Back when Nico first learned to navigate around YouTube and other sites with science videos, I was worried about what he might stumble onto. As we discussed here, he was confused by a weird conspiracy theory movie that looked like a science movie. But that problem turned out to be a lot less difficult to handle than I’d anticipated.
I simply explained to Nico that anyone can post things to the Internet, so a lot of things there (like that conspiracy theory video) aren’t real — they’re just joke movies. And it appears that he grasped that with no difficulty. Now, when he plays that he’s making his own science documentaries, if he starts making stuff up off the top of his head, he’ll tell me that that part is a joke.
Not only that, but one day I heard the sound of a creationist-anti-evolution movie coming from Nico’s room, and went to investigate. As soon as he saw me enter, he looked up and explained that it was a joke movie. That surprised me a bit since I’ve never talked to Nico about creationism at all, so I’m not sure how he identified the video as spurious. It’s probably just that their logical fallacies are so obvious that even a seven-year-old can pick up on them.
Anyway, I’ve asked Nico for a list of his favorite astronomy movies (which he found by himself on the Internet), and today I’ll share the list with you. I confirm that they’re great, and we’ve learned quite a lot of astronomy and physics by watching them together!
First, the video that started it all: The universe – How big are you? Nico found this video by using google image search, and he loved it so much that we bookmarked it for him on his computer. From there he noticed the “Related Videos” sidebar, and it was all downhill from there…
Nico also discovered the videos by the Spitzer Science Center. These are really fantastic for kids because the astronomers post both serious short films (like the “Ask an Astronomer” series) as well as funny sci-fi shows (that teach real astronomy) like the “Robot Astronomy Talk Show.”
Nico’s favorite, however, is the site How stuff works, which posts astronomy documentaries from the Discovery channel. He had a whole long list of videos to include from this site, such as weather on Jupiter, Space School: the Solar System, the Jovian Planets, the Terrestrial Planets and more!
And our latest video of choice has been a fun little explanation of general relativity and gravity. I can’t wait to see what else I’ll learn from this crazy kid! 
Joyce Said,
July 2, 2009 @ 12:06 pm
Love it…your raising a little science geek who will someday save the planet!
chanson Said,
July 2, 2009 @ 12:59 pm
Thanks, I hope so! He’s actually learned quite a lot of environmentalism from his science videos as well (including information about over-fishing, global warming, etc.) and he’s concerned about finding solutions.
Jake Said,
July 2, 2009 @ 1:30 pm
Hello,
I work for Spitzer Space Telescope. We appreciate you commenting on our videos and passing the buck. If you wish to contact us via email, we could send you some educational items, such as posters, a DVD and bookmarks for your child. Also if your interisted, we have student teacher programs, we could send you information on how your child can get general astronomy lesson plans as part of the regular curiculum for the entire school.
chanson Said,
July 2, 2009 @ 4:26 pm
Jake — wow, thanks! My kids would love that! I’m walking out the door right now, but I’ll email you tomorrow for more details.
Anonymous Said,
September 4, 2009 @ 5:51 pm
[...] kids just can’t get enough of the solar system! From watching some of his favorite astronomy videos on the Internet (in particular this one), Nico decided he really wanted to explore the scale model of the solar [...]
sam hall Said,
December 13, 2009 @ 12:35 pm
has he seen the “Hubblecast” series?
http://www.spacetelescope.org/videos/archive/topic/hubblecast/viewall/1
Perhaps a bit farther along than his interest right now, but a very well-done series.