Show Overview for Grades 7 and older
Shows are on Tuesday and Thursday mornings only at 10:00 & 11:30 during the college's fall and spring semesters. Maximum of 72 people per show.
Please refer to for more information on the standards discussed in the shows.
Shows
Oasis in Space and Solar System vocabulary list.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars. After the evening sky tour, you will experience the all-dome video called 鈥淥asis In Space.鈥�
A 24-minute all-dome video from Spitz Creative Media (link will appear in a new window), this show takes you on a journey through the solar system to experience the beautiful planets and satellites up close as you search for places with liquid water. You start by seeing how the solar system formed from a gas cloud in our galaxy and then experiencing the early Earth before the oceans formed. In the present day you will explore Earth, with its vast oceans that make life possible.
Then you fly by the other planets and moons one by one in the search for liquid water. Each investigation of a planet is accompanied by a full descriptions of its characteristics, such as atmosphere, temperature, and composition.
Spectacular pictures invite students to draw their own conclusions about the other orbiting bodies in our solar system: is there water out there? Is there life beyond Earth?
Teacher's Guide to Oasis in Space (from Spitz---a 5.7 MB (!) PDF download)
Key Concepts
- Constellations, myths and why constellations appear to move through the sky
- Sun facts
- Sun and planet size comparison (scale model of the solar system)
- A brief description of each of the planets and some of their major features
Standards
Those of Secrets of the Cardboard Rocket, PLUS
- Grade 8: Physical Science- 4a, 4b
- Grade 9: Earth Science- 1a, 1c, 2
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will go on an immersive tour of the Sun and planets (even dwarf planet, Pluto). This 29-minute 鈥渉ome-grown鈥� show is a greatly improved version of the original planetarium's classic 鈥淪olar System鈥� show using the 3D models of Starry Night Dome.
Unlike other solar system shows, you will see how the Sun and planets compare to the Earth and also learn about the vast distances between the planets. Near the end of the show, you will take a trip to the next star system to see what the sky would like from there and finally take a trip up out of the Milky Way to see how the solar system compares with a typical galaxy.
Key Concepts
- Constellations, myths and why constellations appear to move through the sky
- Sun facts
- Sun and planet size comparison (scale model of the solar system)
- A brief description of each of the planets and some of their major features
Standards
Those of Secret of the Cardboard Rocket PLUS
- Grade 8: Physical Science- 4c;
- Grades 9-12: Earth Science- 1a, 1c, 1d, 1e, 2a.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will go on a history of the telescope to the future of astronomy and learn about the properties of light along the way. Produced to engage and appeal to audiences of all ages, "Two Small Pieces of Glass" traces the history of the telescope from Galileo's modifications to a child's spyglass鈥攗sing two small pieces of glass鈥攖o the launch of NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and the future of astronomy. It explores the wonder and discovery made by astronomers through out the last 400 years. Link to more about Two Small Pieces of Glass on the 400 Years of the Telescope website.
Key Concepts
- Constellations, myths and why constellations appear to move through the sky
- History of the development of the telescope and its use
- Types of telescopes
- Powers of telescope
- Analysis of light, spectra, spectroscopy
- Doppler effect
- Discoveries made with telescopes including Milky Way structure, other galaxies, Hubble expansion
- Atmosphere's effect on light from space
- Future designs for telescopes
Standards
- Grade 3:Earth Sciences- 4a, 4b, 4c, 4d, 4e; Physical Sciences- 1a, 2, 2b, 2c, 2d
- Grade 5: Earth Sciences- 5a, b, c
- Grade 6: Earth Sciences- 3a, 3d; 4b
- Grade 7: Physical Sciences- 6a, 6b, 6d, 6e, 6f
- Grade 8: Earth Sciences- 4a, 4b, 4
- Grade 9-12:
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will investigate the boundary between our Solar System and the rest of our galaxy. Designed for audiences with an appreciation for the challenges of space science and a desire to learn more about science research, IBEX: Search for the Edge of the Solar System follows the creation of NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX).
Audiences will get an in-depth look at the mission and how IBEX is collecting high-speed atoms to create a map of our Solar System's boundary.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. After the evening sky tour, you will go on an immersive of the first 50 years of space exploration called "Dawn of the Space Age".
This 40-minute historically-accurate show lets you experience all of the "firsts" in mankind's exploration of space from the launch of Sputnik in 1957 to the first privately-funded craft "SpaceShip One" by being there with the spacecraft and astronauts themselves. Be immersed with this most accurate historic reconstruction of humanity's first steps into space.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will travel to the Arctic and Antarctic regions of our planet to examine the ecosystems that live and thrive there and see how their survival is connected with our own.
Beyond Earth, we'll see how the existence of ice shapes the landscapes and the natural systems on other planets and moons in our solar system, including Mars, Titan, and Enceladus.
A majority of the show is about the polar regions on Earth, so this show would be especially good for earth science units.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars. After the evening sky tour, you will experience the all-dome video called "Black Holes: The Other Side of Infinity".
A 23-minute all-dome video from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, this show brings the current science of black holes to the dome screen. Supported by grants from NASA's high-energy GLAST telescope project and the National Science Foundation, this cutting-edge fulldome projection features high-resolution, animated visualizations of cosmic phenomena, working with real data generated by computer simulations. [A visualization (as opposed to a Hollywood-type movie) uses only real data and computer simulations of real processes, not some artist's imagination.]
Audiences will be dazzled with striking, immersive animations of the formation of the early universe, star birth and death, the collision of giant galaxies, and a simulated flight to a supermassive black hole lurking at the center of our own Milky Way Galaxy. Teacher's Guide to Black Holes (from Denver MNS---a 152 kB PDF download) and NASA description (link will appear in a new window).
Key Concepts
- Constellations, myths and why constellations appear to move through the sky
- Formation of Black Holes
- Life and death of stars
- Milky Way Galaxy
- Galaxies
- Gravity as warping of space
Standards
- Grade 8: Physical Science- 2g, 4a, 4b, 4e
- Grades 9-12: Earth Science- 1e, 2a, 2b, 2d
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will explore the inner workings of Earth's climate system by the producers of "Black Holes".
"Dynamic Earth" integrates the physical and biological sciences in exploring the impact of solar and terrestrial energy sources on the climate. Examinations of the Earth-Sun system, plate tectonics, and the carbon cycle are presented as foundational background to the primary focus of the program: the intricate connection between Earth's energy trails and the environmental systems that shape its climate. An excellent show for earth science students.
Stunning satellite data visualizations, supercomputing simulations, and photorealistic animations are combined to allow the student unprecedented insights into the inner workings of Earth's dynamic climate system. Students will find the science captivating, the images enthralling and the narrative, by actor Liam Neeson, compelling. Educator's Guide for Dynamic Earth and Dynamic Earth website.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will explore the most energetic volcanic eruptions possible on the Earth: supervolcanoes!
The Supervolcanoes show looks back at the (fortunately) rare class of eruptions that release many thousands of times more energy, lava, and ash than Mt St Helens did in 1980 or Mt Pinitubo did in 1991. These supervolcano eruptions affect the entire planet for decades to millennia. The program moves beyond Earth to explore the impact of giant volcanic eruptions around our solar system. Audiences will fly down to Neptune's frigid moon Triton, and onto the ultimate volcanic world: Jupiter's moon Io. On a visit to a legendary North American hot spot, Yellowstone National Park, the film asks: can a supervolcano erupt in our time?
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will explore what causes earthquakes using scientific visualizations of the processes happening in the Earth's interior.
"Earthquake" begins with an all digital, recreation of the 7.9-magnitude San Francisco earthquake in 1906, followed by a scientific dissection of the event鈥攊ncluding views of the underground fault plane and the propagation of seismic energy waves based on supercomputer simulations. We then embark on a high-speed tour of the past 200 million years, witnessing the formation of the Atlantic Ocean, flying over the cradle of humanity in Africa's Great Rift Valley, and visiting sites of historic earthquakes in India, China, and Japan鈥攊ncluding the 9.0-magnitude Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in March 2011. The show ends with a look at the modern building strategies used by scientists and engineers for a safer and better prepared future.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will explore the smaller bodies in our solar system: asteroids, comets, and dwarf planets.
Asteroids and comets have collided with our planet throughout its history, changing the course of life on Earth and shaping the world we know today. Narrated by George Takei, "Incoming!" explores the past, present, and future of our Solar System and the landmark discoveries scientists have made sending spacecraft to visit tiny worlds. Cutting-edge visualizations bring real-time data from current NASA missions to life while taking audiences on a ride through the dynamic story of our cosmic origins. Along the way, audiences will discover what these impacts from above can teach us鈥攁nd how scientific advances may allow us to find and track cosmic threats before they reach planet Earth.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will take a stunning voyage through time and space that conveys, through an arresting combination of sights and sounds, the Universe revealed to us by science.
The night sky, both beautiful and mysterious, has been the subject of campfire stories, ancient myths and awe for as long as there have been people. A desire to comprehend the Universe may well be humanity's oldest shared intellectual experience. Yet only recently have we truly begun to grasp our place in the immensity of the cosmos. "From Earth to the Universe" tours the various worlds in the Solar System and the ferocity of the scorching Sun. It then leaves our home to take the audience out to the colorful birthplaces and burial grounds of stars, and still further out, beyond the Milky Way, to the unimaginable immensity of myriads of galaxies. Along the way, the audience will learn about the history of astronomy, the invention of the telescope, and today's giant telescopes that allow us to probe ever deeper into the Universe.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will explore how NASA engineers build the amazing ships that take us on journeys across the cosmos.
鈥滷rom Dream to Discovery鈥� begins with an exploration of the Hubble Space Telescope, with its many intricate parts that must work together to help this observatory achieve great things. From there, we explore the James Webb Space Telescope, currently under testing at NASA. Finally, the show explores the New Horizons mission to Pluto, revealing the engineering challenges the mission has faced in its ten-year headlong rush to a distant fascinating world.
You will first go on a live tour of the evening sky with our Planetarium Director, Nick Strobel, pointing out the constellations and planets you will see in this evening's sky. Then you will experience a truly dark night sky and understand how light pollution affects our view of the stars.
After the evening sky tour, you will find out what it would be like to fly to Mars.
鈥滵estination Mars" explores the work being done around the globe to help make the dream of getting humans to Mars a reality. Fly through the International Space Station, where astronauts are already living and working in space, and follow the rockets and vehicles that will take humans beyond the Moon and, one day, all the way to Mars!
Get Started
Today.
