Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from A Laboratory Manual in Astronomy
The present laboratory manual has grown out of the needs of my own students during the past fifteen years It is based upon a primer called Questions on the Sky, which was printed in 1893, especially for the use of students at Smith College. Teachers who have expressed their approval of the primer may be interested to know that the questions given there are republished here with some modifications and addi tions. After the introductory chapters on almanacs, maps, and globes, all the questions proposed are designed to be answered directly from observation or by data obtained from observation. The one aim and object of the book is to lead to direct study of the heavens.
For the convenience of teachers and students the number of observations suggested is large. Few of them, comparatively, should be undertaken by any one student. But it needs only a modicum of experience to show that astronomy more than other sciences demands large room for choice and adaptation. The factors which condition the work of young observers are so many and varied that teachers within a few miles of each other may require different sets of topics, and students in the same class often work to the best advantage along different lines.
The manual is designed to be used in connection with one of the standard works on general astronomy, like those of Young and Newcomb and while it has seemed necessary to include a few definitions and explanations, no inroad has been made into the province of the regular textbook, and it has invariably been left to the teacher to call attention to inferences and conclusions which depend jointly upon reading and observing.
The references made to Young throughout the book refer to the revised edition of Young's General Astronomy, and Elements of Astronomy. The letter E. Before the number of the article indicates that the reference is to the Elements.
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