Planets, stars, galaxies, and other objects in space give off a wide range of visible and invisible forms of light. Because different forms of light have different characteristics, no single observatory can detect all wavelengths. Learn about the electromagnetic spectrum in April's Night Sky Notes!

International Observe the Moon Night is on October 16 this year- but you can observe the Moon whenever it's up, day or night! While binoculars and telescopes certainly reveal incredible details of our neighbor's surface, these tools are not the only way to observe details about our Moon. There are more ways to observe the moon than you might expect, just using common household materials! Find out more about these unconventional techniques inside our latest article.

The Astronomical League produces monthly star maps in both English and Spanish. We have mirrored downloadable copies of the latest guides inside.

NASA's Night Sky Notes are free monthly articles designed for your club's newsletter, website, and other local papers and newsletters, featuring stargazing and NASA science to share with your communities. Find the latest articles- and archives - here!

March is the start of spring in the Northern Hemisphere; with that, the hunt for Messier objects can begin! Learn how to spot a handful of these deep-sky objects in March's Night Sky Notes!

Download this 2025 poster to share in celebrations from eclipses to the International Observe the Moon Night - and many more in between! 

Light pollution hinders astronomers and impacts many others. Learn how to measure and reduce it with smart lighting and community education efforts inside February's Night Sky Notes article, originally published in November 2018.

January 2025 will be an excellent opportunity to spot Mars and some of its details with a medium-sized telescope. Be sure to catch these three events this month.

This year, Night Sky Network celebrated its 20 year anniversary! Learn about the history of this project in this special article.

Jupiter is bright and easy to spot from our vantage point on Earth, helped by its massive size and banded, reflective cloud tops. Find out how you can see it for yourself inside December's Night Sky Notes article, originally published February 2023.

Join the NASA Night Sky Network on Tuesday, November 19, at 5:00 PM Pacific Time (8:00 PM Eastern) along with Dr. Kimberly Arcand where we’ll discuss 25 years of Chandra X-ray Observatory discoveries.

Halloween is a great time some spooky sidewalk astronomy! Find tips and resources to help bring the latest space science to your local community of ghouls and goblins inside!

Get ready for the next comet and find out how comets are connected to some of our favorite annual astronomy events with November's Night Sky Notes!

If you're thinking of a galaxy, the image in your head is probably the Andromeda Galaxy! Studies of this massive neighboring galaxy, also called M31, have played an incredibly important role in shaping modern astronomy. Find out how you can see it for yourself inside October's Night Sky Notes article, originally published September 2021.

Our Moon isn't the only one that can be seen from Earth. Learn about some of the largest moons in our Solar System with September's Night Sky Notes, just in time for International Observe the Moon Night!

What happens when rain or inclement weather rolls in, and you need to do something with your visitors while you wait for the skies to clear up? Well, after you double check to make sure you've safely stashed your telescope, try out one of these popular ni

International Observe the Moon Night is a wonderful chance to connect with fans of our moon from all around the world! This resource page contains links to many moon-related Night Sky Network outreach activities, handouts, and related resources.

Observing the sky is a part of being human, and eclipses are no exception. These tellings have been entrusted to us, so let us honor the cultures who have shared them with us.

Find all Toolkit Manuals in one place with all of the activities in the original Toolkits listed in one place

Want a quick and easy way to illustrate what opposition is for Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, or other outer worlds? Jerelyn Ramirez of the Kansas Astronomical Observers created a toolkit hack using our "Exploring the Solar System" worksheet to do that!

Membership in the Night Sky Network program offers clubs and individuals a few key benefits! Check them out inside.

Try out some best practices for public engagement with girls with help from these five short videos.

Have you ever wanted to take your own beautiful astrophotos, but felt intimidated? Anyone can take astrophotos, even if the only camera you have is on your smartphone - you just need to practice! Find out how you can do smartphone astrophotography in our latest article!

March skies feature many dazzling stars and constellations but two of the brightest stars are the focus of our attention this month: Sirius and Procyon, the dog stars! Discover more about these two nearby star systems inside.

Have you ever seen the Milky Way overhead in a dark sky? Did you know that's the disk of our galaxy - from inside?

All of the people on this banner work together to capture the beautiful images we see

Find out how dark your skies are with these simple tools that demonstrate limiting magnitude with two famous constellations: Orion and Scorpius.

Treat your telescope's visitors to these stickers and celebrate viewing a featured planet!

Discover the secrets of light and filters with this interactive, visitor-led inquiry into the use of filters by astronomers, artists, and code-breakers

Shielding lights improves our safety and visibility, along with improving our view of the night sky. Light pollution has health effects on animals, including people! Find out more about how proper shielding on lights can benefit everyone!

Learn about legends told about the night sky around the world and throughout time with this activity. Create your own story about a constellation visible in tonight's sky. 

This set of 7 activities and demos will engage visitors with dark skies, color filters, sky legends from around the world, and the people who make astronomy happen.

Discover evening Moon phases and lunar science with these printable cards.

Discover a variety of myths about the Moon with this resource.

This activity helps you demonstrate how transits of our Sun by Venus and Mercury work, and how transits are used to detect exoplanets.

Looking for some quick and simple outreach materials? Want to give your visitors something to remember your event, engage their interest, or spark their interest in more astronomy? These handouts from the Night Sky Network may be just the thing you need!

Using magnets and magnetic marbles, demonstrate the effect black holes have on nearby stars.

Many astronomy topics come up over and over again. This is a list of NSN articles about some popular astronomy topics you can use.

Helpful resources for club coordinators to help them navigate the NSN program's resources, website, and club & event management tools.

Solar eclipses happen on average twice a year somewhere on Earth. These activities show what's happening and why!

NASA science may seem to be focused on the stars, but it all comes back down to Earth in some surprising ways. Find out more via NASA Spinoff.

Use this banner with views of the Sun in different wavelengths to prepare visitors for observing the Sun. See how different wavelengths of light reveal a variety of features caused by the Sun's magnetic activity.

This ToolKit provides activities and demonstrations that explore the Sun and its powerful magnetic fields, how these fields generate the features we observe, and how the Sun's magnetic activity affects our way of life and technologies here on Earth.

Use this PowerPoint in conjunction with the activities included on the Space Rocks ToolKit or on its own to discuss asteroids, comets, and the potential hazards of Near Earth Objects.

Find asteroids in a star field and discover why astronomers are locating even more asteroids using powerful infrared telescopes like NEOWISE.

Learn all about meteorites with this hands-on activity: where they come from, how they got here, and what they are made of. Compare the characteristics of meteorites and Earth rocks in this engaging activity.

Explore the asteroid belt in this astronomy activity and learn some surprising truths about just how difficult it would actually be to navigate. It may not be as tightly packed as Hollywood would have you believe!

Create craters on models of the Moon and Earth in this fun and messy outreach activity. Investigate the properties of Earth that hide past cratering events, such as movement of the crust, erosion, water, and a protective atmosphere.

Many beautiful meteor showers light up our skies throughout the year. This handout gives out some vital information about meteors and when to spot them, and is appropriate for all audiences.

This set of playing cards can help you kick start discussions of the characteristics of asteroids, comets, planets, and moons in our solar system. Help your visitors engage in scientific thinking by sorting objects into categories by shared features.

Use this model of the Milky Way and other galaxies to indicate relative distances to other galaxies

This set of activities provides tools to help your visitors understand the two main reasons views through the telescope do not look like photographs from NASA's space telescopes and popular astrophotographers.

This video series is designed to help amateur astronomers make their time with the public and clubs more enjoyable when performing astronomy outreach.

Model the habitable zone around stars and how an atmosphere influences the habitability of a planet.

Find out about the NASA Kepler Mission which is searching for Earth-like planets around other stars.

Discover the life cycle of stars and when supernovae happen with this activity and handout.

How far apart is everything in our solar system? It can be hard to imagine, but this activity can help! Try out this simple Pocket Solar System activity that is sure to get an "Ah-ha!" moment from your visitors, using just a marker and a strip of paper.

This activity is a great way to organize a star party, and gives visitors context to what they will be viewing as they tour the telescopes and observe a variety of naked-eye and telescopic treats that occupy the Summer Triangle.

Use a flour model of the surface of the Moon to show how shadows show more details than direct light. Participants see the difference between what is observable during a full Moon and a partially dark Moon.

You can prepare visitors to observe through your telescope by helping them understand why they see what they see and how the telescope works to enhance their vision. The activity includes discussions of averted vision and field of view.

Use these demonstrations to answer questions that the public may have about how telescopes work. Show how both a reflector and a refractor work.

You can show the basics of how telescopes collect light with these activities, by using just a few props.

These simple demonstrations are a great way to illustrate the path of light as it reflects off of mirrors and how this is used in telescopes, especially if you have ever been asked why the Moon appears "flipped" or "upside down" in your eyepiece!

This quick, fun game shows players the value of supernovae in the universe. Players discover that almost all elements that make up the Earth and all its living things were made inside stars that go supernova.

Use a set of scaled balls and beads to show the relative sizes of the planets, the Moon, Ceres, and Pluto to each other and to the Sun. This permanent model can be used over and over again in many ways. Handout included,and can be downloaded separately.

This simple and engaging activity explains nuclear fusion and how radiation is generated by stars, using marshmallows as a delicious model.

Participants imagine themselves inside a large star at the end of its life, just as it is about to go supernova.

Has anyone ever asked you if you could see the flag on the Moon with a telescope? Want to know what the 25X magnification on that telescope means? Find out why size matters with telescopes when it comes to light collecting

Your visitors become teams of scientists living on a planet orbiting a distant star. They are on the threshold of exploring their own planetary system for the first time

Where are the distant worlds in the night sky? Use these monthly star maps to find constellations and to identify stars with extrasolar planets.

Use these IYA Discovery Guides to discover the excitement of the International Year of Astronomy. August's theme is Rocks and Ice in the Solar System. Get ready for the Perseid meteor shower this month and find out just what a "shooting star" is. The Cook Up a Comet activity is always a hit!

Exploring the Solar System ToolKit Manual includes hands-on activities to show the structure of our Solar System, including models for sizes and distances, and to connect what is seen in the sky with where the planets are in relation to Earth.

The PlanetQuest Toolkit's complete manual provides hands-on activities and observing using telescopes to learn about discovering exoplanets: planets orbiting other stars. 

These colorful exoplanet postcards, featuring beautiful illustrations by renowned space artist Lynette Cook, showcase some of what's known about planets orbiting other stars. Uploaded: November 2005

The ToolKit consists of hands-on activities and resources that are designed to address gravity in general and black holes in particular as an extreme form of gravity.

This handy presentation can help you answer some common questions asked by the public about black holes.

As amateur astronomers we regularly share our knowledge, time, and telescopes with our communities. Check out research that informed the beginnings of the Night Sky Network!