Planetarium Progams

Take a planetarium trip to the Southern Hemisphere to see how the stars look in Africa. Find Isilimela, the “Digging Stars” (Pleiades), and watch for the rising of the bright star Naka (Canopus) to mark the beginning of a special season. See what sky images are seen by several African cultures, including Zulu, Bushman, and Egyptian.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

If the sun were red, what would your blue jeans look like? What can colors tell us about the stars and planets? What colors from space are visible to our eyes? The planetarium becomes a laboratory for experimenting with all the colors of the rainbow—and even some colors from beyond the rainbow!
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

The lore of the stars and other treasures of the sky come to Earth in our planetarium. Learn to identify the most prominent constellations of the season in the planetarium sky with a simple star map. Keep your map to help you find the constellations in the real nighttime sky.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Join in the spirit of human exploration. Start with the Polynesians, who hundreds of years ago sailed their canoes thousands of miles between tiny islands in the vast Pacific Ocean. The wind, the waves, and stars are your guides as we recreate an ocean journey for you in our planetarium. The spirit then continues with our exploration of Mars.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Thousands of years ago, Polynesian explorers stumbled upon the Hawaiian Islands and the volcano Mauna Kea. Today, astronomers are modern-day explorers that come to Mauna Kea from all over the world. Find out why the “white mountain” of Hawaii is one of the best sites on Earth for astronomical exploration. Learn about adaptive optics and how the largest reflective telescope in the world is helping people explore to the very edges of the Universe.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Take an imaginary trip into space. Start the excursion by speeding through a whole day in our planetarium “time machine” and then identifying the Big Dipper. Take off with the launch of a spaceship and learn how things move in space, how astronauts eat food in a weightless environment, and how satellites are put into orbit. Don’t worry, you’ll return safe and sound!
Recommended for ages 4–7.

One of the missions of the Hubble Space Telescope is to see the most distant things in our universe. But how do we tell how far away those things really are? Learn about various ways to determine distances as you hop on stepping stones to farther and farther places, starting in the planetarium and then to the Moon, the Solar System, nearby stars, the Milky Way galaxy, and clusters of galaxies.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Hundreds of years ago the Polynesians sailed their canoes thousands of miles between tiny islands in the vast Pacific Ocean. The wind, the waves, and the stars are your guides as we recreate an ocean journey for you in our planetarium
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Pack your astronaut bags with everything you need for an imaginary trip to the Moon. Start with a time traveler’s view of the changing shapes of the Moon as viewed from Earth. Then land on the Moon and go for an imaginary stroll with lots of “lunatic” excitement and adventure.
Recommended for ages 4–7.

Take a tour of the fascinating worlds that orbit Earth and other planets. Discover the reasons for moon phases and eclipses. Explore Jupiter’s moons as Galileo saw them 400 years ago, and see modern images from the Galileo space probe. Learn about NASA’s current Cassini mission now studying Saturn and its mysterious moons.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

There are hundreds of Native American cultures, each with distinctive views of the heavens. Observe moon cycles and changes in the sunrise and sunset positions on the horizon to see how these practices help Native Americans stay in tune with the harmonies of nature. Visit the Hupa people of northern California, as well as a few other sites such as Medicine Wheel in northern Wyoming, Chaco Canyon in New Mexico, and the lands of the Mayans and Incas.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

A dazzling spectacle, the northern lights have baffled humankind for centuries. What are these gigantic displays of light draping their brilliance across the polar sky? How did ancient peoples react to these celestial phenomena? How do we explain the northern lights today? Learn this and more in our exciting Planetarium program.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Other Worlds? Sure! Explore our Solar System with all its planets and moons, and find out how planets are detected near other stars. Other Beings? Well, no one really knows, but you will explore which of the hundreds of billions of stars in the galaxy might be host to life-bearing planets. You will assess the chances that someone, somewhere in the Milky Way, is ready to make contact with us on Earth.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Rainbows, sunsets, auroras, haloes—all beautiful phenomena seen here on Earth, but they originate far, far from us at the Sun! Our Sun makes life possible here at home. We use it as a source of energy, as a timekeeper, and as a laboratory. Observe the Sun even as our earliest ancestors did for their own survival. Discover what it means to be a magnetic star like the Sun. Find out what sunspots are and where they come from. Learn how lucky we are to have our very own star.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

The Red Planet has always held mysteries for us, even from the most ancient of times. To unravel some of these secrets, learn how to spot Mars in the night sky. Then study Mars through a telescope before learning how space probes have updated—and changed—what we know about our planetary neighbor. With missions operating on and around Mars right now—and more to come—there is a lot to discover!
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Among the planets in our Solar System, Saturn is the undisputed “Lord of the Rings”. A favorite telescopic target, Saturn has thrilled and intrigued since Galileo first peered through his own telescope at it. The Cassini-Huygens probe will help answer some of our deepest questions about the ringed-planet and its flotilla of satellites. Come on a voyage to Saturn and a voyage of discovery!
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Not too many years ago, even people living in the heart of cities could look up and see thousands of stars in the night sky. Today, light pollution is everywhere; there are only a few places left untouched where you can still see the stars as our ancestors did. Learn how you can help “save the night” so that our children will still be able to look at the splendor of the night sky!
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

What's that in the sky? We use our friendly planetarium as a time machine to speed through a day—sunrise to sunset—observing the sky and seeing how the Sun’s position changes throughout the day. Once night falls, the audience can stargaze at the Big Dipper, and imagine pictures in the stars. What can you see in a sky full of stars?
Recommended for ages 4–8.

The ruins of Stonehenge are some of the great mysteries of all time. In this show we set our planetarium sky for southern England and, rolling back our planetarium time machine, investigate the possibility that these ancient ruins were used as an astronomical observatory 4,500 years ago.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Astronomers have found a galaxy of planets lurking light-years from our Solar System! Strange Planets explores these extrasolar planets, but how do you find a planet orbiting another star? Is it even possible? Learn the latest astronomical techniques for identifying extrasolar planets and measuring their size, mass, and temperature. Then find an easy-to-spot star in the night sky that has an extrasolar planet orbiting it!
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

Comets colliding with Earth made our planet a good place for life to begin, but later comet and asteroid impacts drastically affected the development of life on Earth. Make your own estimate of how often Earth has been hit by comets or asteroids. Find out how sciences such as astronomy, chemistry, paleontology, and geology are all needed to shed light on the mystery of dinosaur extinction.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.

On June 8, 2004, Venus transited—that is, passed directly in front of—the Sun. A transit like this is so rare, that no human alive today had witnessed it before! Historically, transits have helped us define our place in the cosmos, and will continue to in the future. Learn how studying transits taught us exactly how big our Solar System is, and how they may be the key to discovering other “Earths” in other solar systems!
Recommended for ages 8 and up.