Finding planets in the night sky. As all the planets including us orbit the sun on the same plane (If you insist on Pluto being a planet, this is the exception to that rule), we see them trace the same arc across the sky as the sun does. This arc is called the ecliptic. So if you know where the sun and moon appear to move from east to west, you can predict where you will see the planets. The easiest to see is Venus as it is always close to the sun, sometimes appearing before dawn and sometimes just after sunset. It appears to be a very bright starlike object with a constant blaze of bright light.
Mars is much smaller and redder, so much so that you may misidentify some red stars like Betelgeuse as Mars. Jupiter is a bright white object not as bright as Venus but brighter than Mars or Saturn. If you take a moment each night to notice the positions of the stars you will see from time to time a 'star' that was not there (in relation to the stars you know) the night before. This is likely to be a planet.
Of course it could be a Supernova, a giant exploded star and if you were the first to notice it, you could be famous!
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