People of long ago didn't have the technology that we have today . But they did know about stars. They counted the stars they could see, and knew exactly where to find them when they looked into the sky. They also named certain groups of stars that seemed to form a picture. The pictures were called constellations.

The reason that we see the constellations the way we do is because of our place in the galaxy. If we were in a different place in the galaxy the constellations wouldn't look the way they do now.

But constellations do change over thousands of years, the stars move around one another.

Here's an example of The Big Dipper, notice that the star to the top right is rotating around the star on the bottom right.

Betelgeuse is in the constellation, Orion. Orion is a constallation of a hunter with a lion in one hand and a club in the other.

The pup star is a very tiny star, it is what we call a dwarf. You can't see the pup because it is so small, but we know it's there because it pulls Sirius making it move to the side.

For more information visit the following sites:

http://www.dibonsmith.com/stars.htm

http://www.fcps.k12.va.us/DIS/OHSICS/planet/constell/constell.htm

http://www.coldwater.k12.mi.us/lms/planetarium/myth/index.html