"Where does the sun come from?" ... is there is a good site to help me explain stuff like this to my 4 year old?

[Fillyjonk]

I do KIND of know...I think...but he is asking this stuff all the time.

Oh I want a sciencey explaination not a relgiious one!

Thoughts?

I just looked at a site called Planet Science...sorry not good at doing the links. It looks a bit chaotic but might have something.

If you type in KS2 Science you might get some good stuff too. Will keep looking.

come to think of it...actually useless site

How deep do you want to go?

How about just making a poster together about the Solar System?

www.bbc.co.uk/science/space/origins/index.shtml

This site also has fun games.

...and nice pictures of nebulae and other such things

thanks for links, thats really helpful! Am going through it now.

Have also found this scholastic

Thought youtube would be helpful but it isn't really.

Some interesting stuff [www.nasa.gov here]]. They do Santa tracking too.

But for little people, I actually think books are better than websites (is that a terribly luddite thing to say?).

Sorryhere

I agree very much re books. He is generally interested in a lot of sciencey stuff and so we read/do things around that. He uses the computer very very little.

Am looking here for a site that will answer his very specific questions in very simple terms, not so much to introduce the ideas. He is asking the questions because they are either not answered in the books, or not answered clearly.

My problem is that he is coming up with questions that are not covered in the books, and I am finding it suprisingly hard to explain these things in very simple terms.

Also it comes up against the boundries of science - he wants to know what caused the Big Bang. now iirc hawking says that it is actually impossible, with our understanding /paragdims of the universe, to look before the big bang, but its a little tricky to explain this to a 4 year old. Also, I am struggling to distinguish "no one knows" from "mummy doesn't know". Etc.

Its not just this, its stuff like "where did life on earth come from"-I mean, I KNOW there are lots of different theories involving comets and so forth, I even know what a lot of them are, but I'd like a site to back me up on this.

(sorry seeker, thats a great link also.

I am surely not alone in this, 4 is surely the beginning of the age of geekdom in little boys? )

The right answer, though, about what caused the big bang is that no one knows (that's from a secular and scientific viewpoint).

People of faith know that it happened when God spoke.

I found it surprisingly hard to introduce the concept of "nobody knows" to my ds.

Interestingly dd was happy with this from an early age - I wonder if this is a gender difference?

I use "some people think...." or "some people believe..." And also "There's lots of things we haven't found out about yet" Ds likes that one - particularly if I add "But maybe when you grow up you will be the one to find out"!

This is one area where people of faith have it easy, in my opinion. "And God Spoke" No intellectual curiosity needed at all.

Nasa is good

I think that it is helpful to use the 'we don't know for sure' or 'Some people think this, but it isn't 100% sure yet' line. Most children will accept that quite well, and it helps to re-inforce the idea that scientific understanding is an ongoing process, rather than a static block of recieved wisdom.

It's nothing to do with intellectual curiosity. You an be intellectual all you like, but you are still not going to get any answers.

Believing that God triggered the Big Bang does not mean a Christian has now interest, understanding or belief in the scientific theory. There are lots of Christian astrophysicists who are highly intellectual.

well yes of course it is true that no one knows.

i mean, you could argue that of most things

but there are a lot of interesting theories, and thats what i'd like presented to me in clear, simple language.

I agree seeker, its about fostering intellectual curiosity.

I honestly thought there'd be some sort of big FAQ site aimed at 4 year olds. its not likethey don't have predictable interests (space, dinosaurs, car engines, etc. oh and oddly, for ds, plants)

But we can continue to strive to find answers and encourage our children to have enquiring, curious minds. Doesn't saying "God did it" preclude this? Or am I missing the point?

ok for my child its about fostering his intellectual curiosity

and i am looking for resources to help me do that

that is all

oh dear

Whey don't you steer him in a direction where there are some answer? How there is life on Earth compared to other planets, for example.

planet science is a nice site generally.

I think you might like Dr Universe

because those are not the questions he is asking, and so it would be more than a little patronising. I'm not going to steer him in a different direction just to make life easier.

am confused, I just wanted a password to this big FAQ site you are all privy to and hiding from me with all the theories about why the dinosaurs died out

ah that is what i wanted, thank you slur

We did the"noone knows for sure" answer and the conversation still hasn't ended, that was last year!!

She accepted that people are still trying to figure it out and there are some good thoughts out there as to a big bang theory. We are staying well away from theological discussion because for us it's nonsense.

We tried to then say what we did know about the sun, which led straight to a discussion about what you could find in the universe (that we know of).

We're finding it's an ongoing subject, we're talking about galaxies atm and have just bought a telescope to look at the moon

No probs