Sharing a new “picture” of the Milky Way with kids

I saw a new image of the Milky Way last week thanks to these two tweets:

Our galaxy is a Pringle!

Aka, it’s not flat. It’s warped & twisted at the edges like a Pringle chip! 🌌

A recent study used 2431 Cepheid stars to map our galaxy, confirming the warping and showing that it’s even more prominent than expected.

Image: J. Skowron/OGLE/U of Warsaw pic.twitter.com/VIXXoAaWYg

— Kaley Brauer (@kaleybrauer) August 7, 2019

The title is terrible but this is fun: https://t.co/5VzwHm1P5u

— Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🙅🏽‍♀️ 🇧🇧🏳️‍🌈 (@IBJIYONGI) August 9, 2019

After seeing the first tweet from Kayley Brauer I was hoping to find a way to talk about this new result with the boys, but didn’t really know what to do. Thanks to the tweet from Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, I learned that the LA Times had put together a terrific presentation that was accessible to kids.

First, I had my older son read the article on his own and then we talked through some of the ideas he had after reading it.

I thought that reading the article on his own would be a little too difficult for my younger son (he’s about to start 8th grade) so instead of having him read it on his own, we went through it together:

Obviously I’m not within 1 billion miles of being an expert on anything related to this new image of the Milky Way, but it was still really fun to talk about it with the boys. I’m very happy that advanced science projects like this one are being shared in ways that kids can see and experience.