Group Visit Programs.

All shows may not be available, please call (517) 355-4676 for more information.

Science Standards How our shows align with current science standards.

Pre-recorded Shows.

The following programs are recorded shows. Each lasts approximately 30 minutes and is followed by a 30 minute live presentation of the current evening sky.

One World, One Sky
Grades Pre-1

You don't need a spaceship to learn about the sun, moon, and stars-just a little imagination! When Big Bird, Elmo, and their friend from China, Hu Hu Zhu, take an imaginary trip to the moon, they learn amazing things along the way.

Instructional Materials
Show Trailer

In My Backyard
Grades Pre-1

Join children's entertainer Fred Penner as he explores things large and small, from the colors of the rainbow, to the reasons for the seasons. Through the use of entertaining songs and immersive environments, children are encouraged to participate while learning about the planets, constellations, meteors, the moon and more.

Our Place in Space
Grades Pre-2

While solving a crossword puzzle about the sky, Scarlet Macaw and her friends explore the cause of day and night, the importance of our star the Sun, the beauty of the constellations, and the variety of objects that make up the Universe.

Zula Patrol: Under the Weather
Grades Pre-3

The stalwart heroes of The Zula Patrol are on an expedition collecting samples of weather for scientist Multo's research. When the Zula gang inadvertently hurts their loyal pet Gorga's feelings, he decides to leave Zula and find another planet to live on. Villain Dark Truder then tricks Gorga into helping with his latest nefarious scheme to rule the universe. The Zula Patrollers find out and go after him-in the process learning all about weather, both terrestrial and interplanetary. Based on the hit TV series.

Instructional Materials
Show Trailers

Perfect Little Planet
Grades 1-5

Discover our solar system through a new set of eyes-a family from another star system seeking the perfect vacation spot. Fly over the surface of Pluto, our best known Dwarf Planet. Dive down the ice cliffs of Miranda. Sail through the rings of Saturn. Feel the lightning storms at Jupiter. And walk on the surface of Mars. Which destination would you choose?

Instructional Materials

Dinosaurs
Grades 1-5

Like almost all children, Celeste is fascinated with dinosaurs. She is preparing a talk for her class about how they went extinct when Moon, a very wise and magical character, poses a tantalizing question: what if I told you that there are still dinosaurs among us? Celeste will join Moon in a journey through time. An exciting adventure that will show them the Earth as it was in the very, very distant past. They will see the fascinating transformations that these animals underwent over millions of years, creating giant creatures, armored beasts and super predators, until the day that a cataclysmic impact event caused a mass extinction on Earth. But all is not lost. Celeste will discover the key to their survival.

Perfect Little Planet
Grades 2-5

The story about an average yellow star on a search for planets of his own to warm and protect. Along his way, he encounters other stars, learns what makes each star special, and discovers that stars can combine to form clusters and galaxies. Eventually, Little Star finds his planets, and each is introduced to audiences along with basic information about the Solar System.

Instructional Materials
Show Trailer

Sky Tellers: Seasons and the Moon
Grades 3 and Up

Seasons and the Moon:

Listen to stories of the stars told by Native American Master Storytellers. In this show, you will hear two stories. "Spring Defeats Winter" retold by Joseph Bruchac (Abenaki) and "The Girl Who Married the Moon" retold by Gayle Ross (Cherokee).


Instructional Materials

Sky Tellers: North Star and Meteors
Grades 3 and Up

North Star and Meteors:

Listen to stories of the stars told by Native American Master Storytellers. In this show, you will hear two stories. "Why the North Star Stands Still" retold by Lynn Moroney (Chickasaw) and "Coyote and the Dancing Stars" retold by Lynn Moroney (Chickasaw).

Instructional Materials

We Are Stars
Grades 4 and Up

What are we made of? Where did it all come from? Explore the secrets of our cosmic chemistry, and our explosive origins. Connect life on Earth to the evolution of the Universe by following the formation of Hydrogen atoms to the synthesis of Carbon, and the molecules for life. Narrated by Andy Serkis.

Instructional Materials
Shiow Trailer

Imagine the Moon
Grades 5 and Up

Explore how the Moon has inspired human creativity, learning, and exploration ever since we have looked to the sky. Each discovery has brought new opportunities to contemplate and imagine, until, driven by dreams, we left Earth and went there in the amazing journeys that culminated in astronauts walking on the Moon. People have imagined the Moon as a glowing disk in the sky, a destination in space, and a world that shares its origin with the Earth. The power of human imagination continues to inspire our relationship with the Moon as our partner in space and companion in our sky.

Show Trailer

Skywatchers of Africa
Grades 5 and Up

For thousands of years, Africans have used their knowledge of the sky to build their societies, shape their spiritual lives, and meet their physical needs for survival. Skywatchers of Africa highlights the diversity of African astronomy, examines cultural uses of the sky that developed throughout history, and celebrates our shared human experience.

Two Small Pieces of Glass
Grades 5 and Up

Learn how the telescope has helped us understand our place in space and continue to expand our understanding of the Universe. Explore the history of the telescope and the discoveries these wonderful tools have made. See how telescopes work and how the largest observatories in the world use them. View the Galilean Moons, Saturn's rings, and spiral structure of galaxies. Learn about the discoveries of Galileo, Huygens, Newton, Hubble, and others.

Instructional Materials
Show Trailer

Big Astronomy
Grades 5 and Up

It takes many people with diverse backgrounds, talents, and skills to run a world-class observatory. Meet a few of these people as they share the wonder of the sky--and the excitement of discovery. Explore the world-class observatories nestled in northern Chile’s mountains and learn why Chile, is an ideal environment for studying the cosmos.

Instructional Materials
Show Trailer

Living In Balance
Grades 5 and Up

Living in Balance: Anishinaabe Star Knowledge highlights Anishinaabe stories of constellations and moons in relation to contemporary insights about environmental changes. Teachings shared by Native Skywatchers Carl Gawboy, William Wilson, and Dr. Annette S. Lee are narrated by Aarin Dokum with Anishinaabemowin translations by Alphonse Pitawanakwat set to art by Elizabeth LaPensée.

Back to the Moon for Good
Grades 6 and Up

This award-winning Google Lunar XPRIZE fulldome planetarium show chronicles teams around the world competing for the largest international incentivized prize in history, by landing a robotic spacecraft on the Moon. The show opens with the first era of space exploration in the late 1960s and early 1970s and ends with a stunning glimpse of a plausible scenario for our future on the Moon.

Show Trailer

Sunstruck
Grades 6 and Up

Discover the wonders of our sun. Its incredible energy has supported life on earth for millennia, but is now threatening our technology and way of life. Travel to the distant future to discover our sun's connection to the universe's cosmic cycle of life and death.

Show Trailer

Bad Astronomy
Grades 6 and Up

Were the Apollo visits to the Moon actually a hoax? Have aliens landed on Earth? Can you tell your future by the stars? Prepare to debunk and tackle pseudoscience head-on with this planetarium show. Based on the popular book and website of the same name, this show offers a unique and fun approach to learning about the cosmos. Join the "Bad Astronomer" Phil Plait as he takes a critical look at popular myths and misconceptions to show audiences how science can be used to evaluate questionable claims.

Instructional Materials
Show Trailer

Violent Universe
Grades 6 and Up

The beauty of a starlit sky conceals the violent forces at work within our universe. From the upheaval of a giant star that explodes to release its material into space, to a future encounter between the Earth and a large asteroid that is too close for comfort, we will witness the forces that hold the universe together and occasionally try to rip it apart. Narrated by Patrick Stewart of Star Trek: The Next Generation and the X-Men films.

Show Trailer

Ice Worlds
Grades 6 and Up

The delicate balance between ice, water and the existence of life has been a topic of exploration and discovery in science for generations. In travels to the Arctic and Antarctic regions of our planet, we'll 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 landscape and the natural systems on other planets and moons in our solar system.

Show Trailer

From Earth to the Universe
Grades 6 and Up

Follow along as we leave our home to take you out to the colorful birthplaces and burial grounds of stars, and still further out, beyond the Milky Way, to the unimaginable immensity of a myriad galaxies. Along the way, you will learn about the history of astronomy, the invention of the telescope, and today's giant telescopes that allow us continue to probe ever deeper into the Universe.

Show Trailer

A Teenager's Guide to the Galaxy
Grades 6 and Up

Created and hosted by cosmically curious teenagers from Milwaukee schools, this unique cosmic experience takes you on a dynamic journey across the universe and through time. Science Topics Include: Black Holes, Cosmology--Origins & Fate of the Universe, Star Cycles, Sun, Earth Origins & History, Water Origins & Chemistry.

The Cosmic Recipe
Grades 6 and Up

Pull up a chair at our Planetarium’s Periodic Table and learn the cosmic recipes that created everything in our world-even us! Discover how the Big Bang and the stars have cooked up the everyday elements we interact with every day-like the calcium in our teeth, the silicon in our smartphones, and even the carbon in our apple pies. Explore the world of chemistry-the protons, neutrons and electrons! See how tiny atoms relate to the mammoth stars! Connect the physical worlds of the small and large in this engaging and inspiring show.

Show Trailer

Out There
Grades 6 and Up

Out There: The Quest for Extrasolar Worlds shows how our perception of our place in the Universe has changed and how the discoveries of exoplanets we made in the last decades even surpassed the dreams of science fiction authors.

Show Trailer

The Sun: Our Living Star
Grades 6 and Up

The Sun has shone on our world for four and a half billion years. The light that warms our skin today has been felt by every person who has ever lived. It is our nearest star and our planet's powerhouse, the source of the energy that drives our winds, our weather and all life. The passage of the Sun's fiery disc across the sky - day by day, month by month - was the only way to keep track of time for countless past civilizations. Discover the secrets of our star in this planetarium show and experience never-before-seen images of the Sun's violent surface in immersive fulldome format.

Show Trailer

Wayfinders
Grades 6 and Up

This full-dome program puts you on the deck of the voyaging canoe Hōkūleʻa as you explore the nearly lost art and science of non-instrument navigation in Hawaiʻi and the Pacific. Produced by Bishop Museum in collaboration with Polynesian Voyaging Society and 1001 Stories.

Experience the Aurora
Grades 6 and Up

Over seven months in the Arctic Circle, our crews captured timelapse images of the Aurora Borealis with high resolution digital SLR cameras outfitted with fisheye lenses. The results are spectacular. For the first time the aurora has been captured as it was meant to be experienced, as a display that covers the entire sky. This immersive show shares the science behind the aurora and tells the story of our quest to find and photograph the aurora for wraparound display in fulldome theaters.

Rising Star
Grades 8 and Up

Rising Star takes you on an astronomical journey from our beginnings through the development of astronomy research in South Africa and looks at what the future of astronomy holds for the country. In addition to introducing multi-wavelength and multi-messenger astronomy, it highlights the many remarkable facilities hosted in South Africa along with some of their latest results. This includes unrestricted views of the 10-metre class Southern African Large Telescope and the most powerful radio telescope in the Southern Hemisphere, MeerKAT. The film is accessible to all ages and aims to excite audiences from around the world about South African astronomy, while inspiring the next generation of astronomers. As the first of its kind to be produced in Africa, Rising Star hopes to stimulate the production of many more locally produced planetarium films from multidisciplinary fields, with the goal of popularizing Africa’s numerous scientific achievements.

Show Trailer

Planet Nine
Grades 8 and Up

Follow Mike Brown and his team at CalTech as they uncover dwarf worlds like the remarkably bright Eris; Haumea, an egg-shaped object rotating incredibly fast; and Sedna, whose orbit takes it deep into the far reaches of the Solar System. Is there a new planet beyond these distant objects? We'll tag along on Mike Brown's first night searching for the ninth planet at the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii. Join us on the hunt!

Show Trailer

Natural Selection
Grades 8 and Up

"Natural Selection" celebrates the 150th anniversary of the publication of "On the Origin of Species" and the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth. We will join Darwin on his voyage with the HMS Beagle to the Galapagos Islands where he was inspired to develop his later theory of transmutation by natural selection. From the comfort of Down House in Kent, Darwin himself will explain the mechanism of natural selection to the audience, and support it by showing many beautiful examples in nature. Even though this show focuses on biology and evolution, a brief astronomical sky talk will follow.

Show Trailer

Phantom of the Universe
Grades 8 and Up

Join us as we showcase an exciting exploration of dark matter, from the Big Bang to its anticipated discovery at the Large Hadron Collider. See the first hints of its existence through the eyes of Fritz Zwicky, the scientist who coined the term "dark matter." From there explore the astral choreography witnessed by Vera Rubin in the Andromeda Galaxy and then plummet deep underground to see the most sensitive dark matter detector on Earth, housed in a former gold mine. Finally journey across space and time to the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, to learn how scientists around the world are collaborating to track down the constituents of dark matter.

Show Trailer

Chasing the Ghost Particle
Grades 8 and Up

Deep in the ice at the heart of Antarctica, IceCube, the biggest and strangest detector in the world waits for mysterious messengers from the cosmos. Scientists are using tiny and elusive particles called neutrinos to explore the most extreme places in the universe. These ghostly neutrinos give us an exclusive way to study powerful cosmic engines like exploding stars and black holes. In this show, stunning simulations of the most energetic places in our universe, and the galaxies around us, are the prelude to a thrilling journey inside IceCube, looking for traces of neutrino collisions in the ice. From one of the most remote locations on Earth to the unexplored regions of the cosmos, this show will take you on a journey you won't forget.

Show Trailer

Mayan Archaeoastronomy
Grades 8 and Up

In a feast of colors and sounds, this show takes a tour of 6 Mayan temples: San Gervasio, Chichen Itzá, Uxmal, Edzná, Palenque and Bonampak where the spectator dives into a Mayan world of knowledge about the importance of the orientations of its temples in relation to the movement of some stars like the Sun, the Moon and Venus.

Show Trailer

The Last Question
Grades 9 and Up

Can entropy be reversed? What is the fate of the universe? Explore these questions in this timeless short story written by one of the greatest science fiction authors of the 20th century.

Pink Floyd: The Planetarium Show

Fully immerse yourself in Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon in our planetarium theater with our stunning visuals that make this album come to life.

Season of Light
All Ages

Many of the familiar customs that we observe this time of year have an astronomical connection. Our holiday offering explores the traditions that we associate with this special season.

Offered only from Thanksgiving to Christmas

Show Trailer

Christmas Constellations
Grades K-3

When we look at the stars, we can play a giant game of dot-to-dot. We can use our imaginations to come up with amazing things from basic shapes to mythical creatures to our favorite animals. In this show, we will use our imaginations for a search through the stars for holiday themed shapes in the sky. This show is suitable for preschoolers, young elementary aged children, and their families.

 

Offered only from Thanksgiving to Christmas.


Live Shows.

The following five programs are live presentations. Each involve student interactions and participation. Each live presentation is tailored to the individual grade level. The programs are approximately 1 hour in length. These programs are not available during the summer, please call if you have questions.

Preschool Sky
Ages 3-5 Years

Basic awareness of the day and night sky are investigated with the help of models, stories, and the planetarium projector. Due to the special characteristics of this age group, the program length will vary between 30 minutes and an hour, according to attention span.

The Night Sky
All Ages

A basic introduction to the sky. All of the bright planets and most of the brightest stars and prominent constellations currently visible in the early evening will be found. Storytelling and student interaction will be used to enhance learning.

The Sun's Family
Grades K-5

Solar system information is presented using models, photos, and student interaction. Students learn to find the bright planets in the current sky.

Moonbeams
Grades 2-5

After watching the moon in the sky, students will look for ways to explain the changes observed. Lunar folklore and moon travel also will be discussed.

The Seasons
Grades 4-6

An overview of how the day and night sky change through the year. Students will predict and observe how the sun's path changes over the year and learn how that relates to changing seasons. They will learn why we see different constellations through the year by looking from an earth and space-based perspective.

Sky Patterns
Grades K-2

This show is geared toward early elementary students and addresses the 1st grade NGSS standard about patterns in the sky. Students will orient themselves in the planetarium using the Big and Little Dippers. Then they will make observations about day and night, how the length of day changes through the seasons, and then how the Moon changes shape over a month. Any time left will look at constellations in the sky.