The Sky is Falling!
Last night we saw two spectacular falling stars. At least that's what we thought they were at first.
I know there are certain times of the year when large numbers of them can be seen so I grabbed our book The Kids' Nature Book by Susan Milord to see if this might be one of those times. In this book they have a nature activity listed for every day of the year. So I turned to August and found that the Perseids meteor showers happen at this time of the year. Every year! Isn't that incredible! If you average out the number of meteors falling it's about 65 meteors lighting up the sky each hour.
The ones we saw were outstanding. I saw one of the meteor's falling and all I could say was “Look! Look!” and point at it. The falling meteor was very bright and took a long time to die out. (compared to what I've seen before) Everyone had a chance to see it since it took awhile to fall. It seemed so close too.
My boys then saw one sreaking across the sky that had a tail. They were stunned. I don't think they have ever seen one quite like it.
The peak day for the Perseids meteor shower is August 11 but showers can be seen now and even after the 11th. According to the Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock this particular shower can be seen July 12 – September 1 each year.
This would make an interesting entry into your nature notebooks too.
So this evening grab a blanket, head outside, and watch some fireworks in nature.
One Comment
AussieinAmerica
Hi,
This might get a bit long…I am going to try and answer your questions..I am excited that I actually know a little now and can share it..cool!
About your pictures…I did the same thing the first time I put a picture on my blog. When I come to your blog a window pops up asking MSN users to sign in. Are you hosting your photo on an msn website? If it is a private account it is possible for you to see it and no one else..only those with the password. Have you read this:
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=195&highlight=posting+pictures
It lays it out quite well. It is titles, “Posting pictures in 10 easy steps”. http://www.Flickr.com is very user friendly. If you try it and have any questions, just ask.
As far as learning how to change my blog – It has been a lot of trial and error….adding something to the template to see if it works, clicking preview…then if it does work I save it. If not, then I click reset changes. If you try this, it is a good idea to save a copy of your template to your computer. I put mine on WordPerfect, but think almost any program like that would work. Open the “Edit Template” window and highlight all of your template(all that weird computer code jargon) and click copy, then paste it into your computer program. Save it, that way if something goes wrong and things get messed up you can just paste this saved one back onto your blog.
I have learned most stuff from the homeschool blogger forums. You can even search for your question in there. I have asked some questions and received great replies from knowledgeable people. Go to the forums by clicking on the forum tab under the homeschoolblogger.com home page. If you want to ask a question in there you have to sign up for an account – it is easy.
I also checked out:
http://www.Htmlgoodies.com
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/hsbtutorial.com
About the books…..if you want to do a thing in the sidebar like I did go to http://www.librarything.com and sign up for an account. It is pretty step by step..feel free to ask questions about that too. Ill try answer what I can..there is still a lot I dont know. If ou want to just write a list in your sidebar..I’m not sure how to do that yet..I’m sure it is easy once you know how.
Lastly, I learned how to change things by doing just what you are doing…asking questions. Mamma1420 was a great help to me.
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/rugbyhs has some good tips too. There are some bloggers out there who will even design your site for you..however, it is very satisfying to figure it out and do it yourself !! 🙂 It is a little time consuming!
I hope I have helped and not just confused you. Please ask me if you dont understand anything I have written..it wont bother me…I am happy to help.
Stacy