Navigator Jack Thatcher commanded the two waka hourua that sailed from Aotearoa (New Zealand) to Rapanui (Easter Island) and back. Te Aurere and its supporting vessel Ngahiraka Mai Tawhiti, known ...
Knowledge about the apparent movement of the Sun, Moon and planets across the celestial sphere is important for wayfinding. You can estimate position and direction by observing, for example ...
When clouds hide the celestial signs, navigators use ocean swells, as well as the wind and waves, to determine their direction. Mau Piailug – grandmaster navigator around the Pacific Ocean – once ...
In this activity, students learn about star constellations and that various cultures have their own names and legends about them. They will appreciate that identifying constellations and ...
In this activity, students learn the cardinal points of the compass. They also learn how to use the Sun and star constellations – the Southern Cross and the Pointers – to identify the cardinal ...
In this activity, students memorise a number of items from the star compass as wayfinding navigators would have to do. This experience may help students understand how and why wayfinders use the ...
Search data from NASA’s Kepler spacecraft for the dips in star light intensity caused by exoplanets – planets that orbit stars other than the Sun. As these exoplanets pass between the star and ...
Globe at Night is an international citizen science campaign to raise public awareness of the impact of light pollution by inviting citizen scientists to measure and submit their night sky ...
Loss of the Night is an international citizen science project aiming to quantify the illumination of the night sky caused by artificial light. By monitoring how bright the night sky is over time ...
The Science Learning Hub has lots of resources for primary teachers related to the night sky in the Planet Earth and Beyond strand of the New Zealand Curriculum. The night sky is fascinating to ...
The Science Learning Hub has a selection of resources that have been translated into te reo Māori and a number of resources that feature both te reo Māori and English. Our webinar Opportunities ...
Science is everywhere, so it’s a great subject to learn from home. You can start by thinking about what science skills you want to develop, knowledge you want to learn or just what you are really ...
In this video, Associate Professor Bob Lloyd states that it is nuclear fusion that fuels the Sun. He then goes on to explain in simple terms how this process works by fusing lighter elements into ...
Otago University Space Physicist Associate Professor Craig Rodger explains what a coronal mass ejection (CME) is. He then goes on to describe the impact such an event could have on the Earth’s ...
Associate Professor Craig Rodger, Space Physics group leader at the University of Otago, explains what the Van Allen belts are. He then describes the effect a coronal mass ejection (CME) can have ...
Elements are formed deep within the cores of certain types of star. Find out more in this interactive.
This timeline lets you see the historical developments in technology related to weather monitoring, measuring and forecasting. It also shows how scientific thinking changed over the centuries as ...
Matariki is the name for the cluster of stars that signals the beginning of the Māori new year. Identify each star by moving its name to its location in the star cluster.
