Stars rise in the east and set in the west, in just the same way that the Sun comes up at sunrise and sinks below the western horizon at sunset. The whole sky seems to turn over our heads once in 23 hours and 56 minutes. This is a typical view of the wheeling sky you would see at latitude 40 degrees north looking towards the south.
Astronomers divide the whole sky into 88 areas, called constellations. The constellations are based around star patterns picked out and named long ago.
