In a K-12 school with fewer than 70 students, it’s easier to respond to individual needs and requests. When some of our students at North Haven Community School indicated that they’d like to have an astronomer come to school, a little research on astronomer-plus-outreach brought up Southern Maine Astronomers, from Portland.
What a find! A few short weeks later, on April 11, not one, but four astronomers arrived on the island, transporting three telescopes, a variety of hands-on enrichment activities and a blow-up full-fledged portable planetarium. The planetarium, which is 10 feet high and 16 feet in diameter, was set up in the gym in minutes. The sun seemed to be cooperating as the three telescopes were set up, one of which had two different filters that enabled us to actually view the sun.
Community members and some students started drifting in for the open house at about 1 p.m. Even at that hour, there were activities both inside and outside.
Joan Chamberlin had younger students creating planispheres, so that by turning a disk corresponding to the date, they could look at the night sky to find various constellations.
They were better able to understand eclipses through the use of shadows and yardsticks, with earth at one end of the yardstick and the moon on the other. They dropped meteors (rocks) and made moon craters in a pan of flour and cocoa. Meanwhile, Ron Thompson provided a PowerPoint presentation on the sun, extremely helpful for those who were waiting to cycle through to the sun telescope.
After Ron’s explanation, Kerry Kertes, a science teacher at Cape Elizabeth High School, and Brian Stephenson, his senior astronomy student, helped adults find sunspots and prominences in the two different eyepieces (with appropriate filters) that protruded from one powerful telescope.
The “prominences,” we learned, are gases that arc from a north pole and a south pole, similar to the arcing that occurs when a magnet is passed over iron filings. Sunspots are actually cooler areas on the surface of the sun. Later, younger students proclaimed their views of the sun through the telescope to be “awesome” and “cool.” Adults expressed similar thoughts, though less tersely.
In the gym, the giant silver planetarium allowed entry through an igloo-like tunnel. Once inside, we could see the stars begin to emerge, becoming more brilliant and more plentiful in the sky as our eyes adjusted to the blackness. Kerry pointed out constellations, the Milky Way and how it was so-named, which stars are hotter than others and why, and where planets are in relation to the stars at certain times of year.
That evening, while waiting for the earth to rotate enough so that the sun could go down, Brian shared part of his light pollution study with students and adults. How much darker was our earth before the advent of electricity?
Brian explained that centuries ago, people could read at night by the light of the stars, but now, in larger cities and even in the Portland area, light pollution means that residents can barely see the stars.
For instance, the constellation Orion can be used as a measure of light pollution, with a magnitude of one, indicating that Orion can barely be discerned (the magnitude most common in the Portland area) and seven, indicating the highest possible number of stars. He challenged us to try to perceive what magnitude Orion achieves on North Haven at night.
Finally, as the sun sank over the back of the school, we were able to go outside and attempt to cobble together all that we had tried to absorb over the course of the afternoon and early evening.
There was Orion, becoming more visible as it got darker. The three telescopes were put to work, all set up within a 20-foot radius in front of the school and trained on different parts of the night sky.
More community members came for the evening viewings. People moved from one telescope to another, exclaiming, “You’ve got to come see Saturn!”, “Joan has found the Leo Trio” (three galaxies near the Leo constellation, about 35 million light years from Earth) and “There’s another star beneath Orion’s belt.”
As the night got darker, the sky uncovered more stars, more constellations, more satellite sightings, and for some, an iridium flare, a very bright reflection of the sun off a satellite panel. Even the four astronomers seemed excited by all that the sky offered that Sunday evening.
And the magnitude of Orion? Depends on which astronomer you talk to, but either a four or a five, perhaps even approaching a six.
Monday found all students, broken into four groups based on grade level, traveling from classroom to planetarium to telescopes, until sprinkles necessitated bringing the telescope lens under cover.
Ultimately, this visit has encouraged the school to bring more astronomy into the classroom. Joan wore a t-shirt declaring that this month is Global Astronomy Month, an event sponsored by Astronomers without Borders, an organization in which Joan is very involved. The motto for the month: One People, One Sky.
Astronomy has the capability of bringing together all ages, all abilities, and all looking in the same direction: upwards.
Thanks go to North Haven Community School, North Haven Arts & Enrichment, Cape Elizabeth High School, and Southern Maine Astronomers for the sponsorship of this program.
Lisa Shields is Arts Coordinator at North Haven Community School.
What a find! A few short weeks later, not one, but four astronomers arrived on the island on April 11, transporting three telescopes, a variety of hands-on enrichment activities and a blow-up full-fledged portable planetarium. The planetarium, which is 10 feet high and 16 feet in diameter, was set up in the gym in minutes. The sun seemed to be cooperating as the three telescopes were set up, one of which had two different filters that enabled us to actually view see the sun.
Community members and some students started drifting in for the open house at about 1 p.m. Even at that hour, there were activities both inside and outside.
Joan Chamberlin had younger students creating planispheres, so that by turning a disk corresponding to the date, they could look at the night sky to find various constellations.
They were better able to understand eclipses through the use of shadows and yardsticks, with earth at one end of the yardstick and the moon on the other. They dropped meteors (rocks) and made moon craters in a pan of flour and cocoa. Meanwhile, Ron Thompson provided a PowerPoint on the sun, extremely helpful for those who were to cycle through to the sun telescope.
After Ron’s explanation, Kerry Kertes, a science teacher at Cape Elizabeth High School, and Brian Stephenson, his senior astronomy student, helped adults find sunspots and prominences in the two different eyepieces (with appropriate filters) that protruded from one powerful telescope.
The “prominences,” we learned, are gases that arc from a north pole and a south pole, similar to the arcing that occurs when a magnet is passed over iron filings. Sunspots are actually cooler areas on the surface of the sun. Later, younger students proclaimed their views of the sun through the telescope to be “awesome” and “cool.” Adults expressed similar thoughts, though less tersely.
In the gym, the giant silver planetarium allowed entry through an igloo-like tunnel. Once inside, we could see the stars begin to emerge, becoming more brilliant and more plentiful in the sky as our eyes adjusted to the blackness. Kerry pointed out constellations, the Milky Way and how it was so-named, which stars are hotter than others and why, and where planets are in relation to the stars at certain times of year.
That evening, while waiting for the earth to rotate enough so that the sun could go down, Brian shared part of his light pollution study with student and adults. How much darker was our earth before the advent of electricity?
Brian explained that centuries ago, people could read at night by the light of the stars, but now, in larger cities and even in the Portland area, light pollution means that residents can barely see the stars.
For instance, the constellation Orion can be used as a measure of light pollution, with a magnitude of one, indicating that Orion can barely be discerned (the magnitude most common in the Portland area) and seven, indicating the highest possible number of stars. He challenged us to try to perceive what magnitude Orion achieves on North Haven at night.
Finally, as the sun sank over the back of the school, we were able to go outside and attempt to cobble together all that we had tried to absorb over the course of the afternoon and early evening.
There was Orion, becoming more visible as it got darker. The three telescopes were all put to work, all set up within a 20-foot radius in front of the school and all trained on different parts of the night sky.
More community members came for the evening viewings. People moved from one telescope to another, exclaiming, “You’ve got to come see Saturn!”, “Joan has found the Leo Trio” (three galaxies near the Leo constellation, about 35 million light years from Earth), and “There’s another star beneath Orion’s belt.”
As the night got darker, the sky uncovered more stars, more constellations, more satellite sightings, and for some, an iridium flare, a very bright reflection of the sun off a satellite panel. Even all four astronomers seemed excited by all that the sky offered that Sunday evening.
And the magnitude of Orion? Depends on which astronomer you talk to, but either a four or a five, and perhaps even approaching a six.
Monday found all students, broken into four groups based on grade level, traveling from classroom to planetarium to telescopes, until sprinkles necessitated bringing the telescope lens under cover.
Ultimately, this visit has encouraged the school to bring more astronomy into the classroom. Joan wore a t-shirt declaring that this month is Global Astronomy Month, an event sponsored by Astronomers without Borders, an organization in which Joan is very involved. The motto for the month: One People, One Sky.
Astronomy has the capability of bringing together all ages, all abilities, and all looking in the same direction: upwards.
Thanks go to North Haven Community School, North Haven Arts & Enrichment, Cape Elizabeth High School, and Southern Maine Astronomers for the sponsorship of this program.
Lisa Shields is Arts Coordinator at North Haven Community School.