Q & A 1. What are the 5 signs that totality is approaching? 2. When is the next solar eclipse? How old will you be? 3. What is the main idea? Give 2 supporting details. (Answers below) Look familiar? This is the path a solar eclipse takes from start to finish. The sun starts on the left side of this diagram. In the next 5 pictures, the moon moves across the sun until it reaches totality, or full eclipse, in the 7th picture. In the last 6 pictures, the sun and moon move back into their regular orbits. If you could view an eclipse from space, and could connect the dots, this is what it would look like. Find the white lines that touch the earth. If you were standing anywhere between them, you’d get to see part of the eclipse. But, if you were standing at the end of the black cone, you’d see the whole entire eclipse from start to finish, the entire totality. Lucky you! This is the Great American Eclipse’s map of totality. You can follow the 3 lines from Oregon to South Carolina. I was close in Lafollette, Tennessee, but we drove 90 minutes southwest to Sweetwater. It was our sweet spot, and totally worth the drive! Want to know what time the eclipse starts? Google it! I found a chart that takes you from Oregon to South Carolina, but it didn’t have Sweetwater, so I googled again. In Sweetwater the eclipse started at 1:04. Totality at 2:32. We saw 2 minutes and 33 seconds of totality. Their site said so! The first picture is totality. Did you know that one minute before totality, the sun starts giving you signs that it’s almost time? I didn’t. The second picture shows that first sign, shadow bands. The earth’s atmosphere refracts the last rays of the sun. Refracting bends the light, like with a rainbow. If you want to see shadow bands, look at something white or light colored. We watched a white truck in the parking lot. My husband spotted them first, of course! Do you think the first picture looks like a diamond ring? Scientists did! It’s the 2nd sign, and it happens about 10-15 seconds before totality. The ring is the sun’s corona. The diamond is the last burst of sunlight. I think it looks like the 6th picture, right before totality. When the diamond fades, the corona’s left. It’s the sun’s outer layer of atmosphere. The sun’s surface is 1.8 million degrees Fahrenheit, but the corona is 200-300 degrees hotter. Water boils and becomes steam at 180 degrees. Can you imagine how hot the sun is? YIKES!!! Do you see the tiny beads of light in the 1st picture? The diagram calls them Baily’s Beads. They show up 5 seconds before totality. I missed them, but my husband saw them, of course. Baily’s Beads aren’t real beads. During an eclipse, the sunlight travels through the moon’s mountains and valleys. From earth the light looks like beads. See the red ring again? It’s called the chromosphere, and it’s the middle layer of the sun’s atmosphere. You see it just a few seconds before totality. Then the other 2 layers of the sun’s atmosphere make it disappear once more. After 90 minutes the moon made the sun disappear. It also made Sweetwater colder and darker. At 2:30 in the afternoon a few stars came out. Finally! Totality! It was incredible! The whole town cheered, including hundreds of visitors. Google Sweetwater, and you can see and hear us. We also took off the special eclipse glasses. Totality is the only time you can look at an eclipse without them. Before , and after totality, we wore them. Outside the totality zone, you didn’t see stars in the middle of the day, and you couldn’t take off the glasses, at all. I’m glad we made the drive. Totally! With totality over, the stars disappeared, and the signs reappeared, but in reverse order. First Bailey’s Beads, then the Diamond Ring, the Corona, and finally the Shadow Bands. When the 1st Diamond Ring appeared, we were on the 6th picture of the diagram. Within 4-5 minutes of time, we were on the 2nd Diamond Ring and the 7th picture. My family stayed to watch for a few more minutes as the moon kept moving away from the sun. Then we left. I’m glad we did! The roads back to the Lafollette were packed, even when we got off interstate and onto back roads. When totality was over, it seemed like everyone in Tennessee was leaving Sweetwater. Looking back at the Great American Eclipse, just 10 days ago, I am so glad we drove to totality, and that I can share it with you. If you weren’t in the zone this time, you’ll have another chance, in only 7 years. Mark your calendar! The next one is coming to a state near you on April 8, 2024. Be there or be square! https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/total-solar-eclipse.html My biggest source for this post is this link. My husband found it and printed out a packet. Without this source, we would have missed things like shadow bands. Thanks to the folks at timeanddate.com for teaching the teacher, and the engineer! Q & A 1. What are the 5 signs that totality is approaching? Shadow bands, diamond ring, corona. Baily’s Beads, and chromosphere 2. When is the next solar eclipse? How old will you be? April 8, 2024, and you’ll have to do your own math 3. What is the main idea? Give 2 supporting details. Main: It’s about the how the great American Eclipse of 2017 came in and out of totality. Supporting detail: The sun goes through 5 stages in the last minute before Totality. Not a supporting detail: I watched totality in Sweetwater, TN.
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Back in 1964 this was the Wapak Women’s Club, and my first school. In those days you didn’t have to go to Kindergarten so it wasn’t at the elementary yet. Also Kindergarten was only for half-day. I don’t remember anything about it, but I’ve been told my dad brought me home. He was teaching Ohio History at Blume Middle School and could slip out to take me home since mom didn’t have a car. I went to Centennial for elementary school. I don’t remember my 1st grade teacher, but I loved Mrs. Metzger and 2nd grade. I became a reader, made all things Indian, and sang along with my ukulele-playing teacher. She even had a class picnic at her house. It was also the year of the green bean incident (Link: http://www.rindabeach.com/blog/dads-get-it-they-just-get-it). In 3rd grade I had Mrs. Crumrine. The only thing I remember is that she sent me a get-well card when I was in the hospital getting my tonsils out. How do teachers know these things? I don’t know, but it meant the world that she remembered me. In grades 4-6, I went to a brand-new building, Northridge. I was one of its first students. In 4th grade I had Mrs. Klayton in 4A. There were 2 other sections of 4th grade at Northridge, and 3 sections at Centennial. For the 1st time Wapak kids were divided between two elementaries. We’d meet again in middle school. In 5th grade I had Mrs. Miller. I was in her first class, and would you believe one of my kids was in her last class? I had Mr. Davis in 6th grade. I remember because he was the first male teacher I had in my elementary career. Other than the principal, he was the only male teacher in an elementary building. Welcome to Junior High! At least that’s what grades 7-9 were called back in the day. Like the Women’s Club, these two building have another history. The 1st was once Wapak’s High School. It’s most famous graduate was Neil Armstrong. The other building was the local library. Dad took me there until the new one was built. The librarians were impressed with the classics I read. Thanks, dad! When I went to Junior High, Dad was never my teacher. He didn’t want that. After getting his master’s degree, he got the job as principal at Harrod Elementary School, but some of his favorite colleagues were my teachers, like Mr. O’Black, Mr. Van Gundy, and Mrs. Carter. My all-time favorite teacher was the band director Miss Souder. She scared me, kind of like Mrs. Metzger, but she pushed me to be grow in concert band, and in private lessons. The band room was on the top floor of the red brick building. Chorus was on the 2nd floor with Mrs. Chadwick. I hated singing, but loved accompanying the singers on the piano. This is my High School, Wapak Senior High. Now it’s Wapak Middle School. My favorite teacher was the band director, Mr. Trump. I spent 3 years with him in concert and marching band. I’ve never been a science person, but I loved two of my science teachers. They got me through 2 difficult subjects! Mr. Taylor was the chemistry teacher. He was always funny. I don’t know how he did it, but he even made the periodic table of elements interesting. Mr. Taylor was a gifted teacher! Mr. Niemeyer taught physics, the hardest class I ever took. It’s also the only class that I got a C, or two, in high school. I was grateful. They were gifts! I tried hard, but the logic of physics never fit my brain. Surprisingly, I held the bridge building record for years, not because I was good at it, but because I recognized a good idea. The 2 brightest people in my class broke their bridge on a Friday. I took the 2 best things from their bridges, put them together, then had my high school boy friend build it, while I wrote my English paper. There’s nothing like procrastination! I was surprised to win that year, and shocked to discover my bridge held the record for years. Somehow I could never confess to Mr. Niemeyer that I didn’t build that bridge, even though I did design it. I’m glad to confess now. I hear it’s good for the soul. After high school, I decided to become a teacher, and there’s nothing like being a Buckeye! I spent 2 years at Ohio State, Lima. I spent most of my time in Galvin Hall, and I remember 2 teachers from those days, Mary Lou Roush and Victor Columbine Mary Lou was my FEEP instructor (Freshman early experience). That was my first teaching class. I went out into the field and got to work as a teacher’s aide. Dad volunteered me again, this time with one of his teachers, Mrs. Ewing. She taught 1st grade. She looked like she was 90 years old, but she knew her 1st graders. She’d even sit on the floor with them. Mary Lou connected what Mrs. Ewing did with classroom best practices, at least what was current in the 70’s. I learned so much from the 2 of them! Victor Columbine was the Geology professor. He loved rocks, and somehow he helped me pass my geology class. But he was absolutely passionate about world history. I learned more from him during a world history class than from anyone else since, especially about the Soviet Union. The things he said about the USSR and Eastern Europe came true during the 80’s, including the fall of the Berlin Wall. This is Arps Hall in Columbus, Ohio. It’s the home of the college of education, and it’s where I had most of my classes during my last 2 years of college. I don’t remember names, but I remember two of my teachers. One handled social studies methods. She also worked at Ohio Village. It was in its infancy back then. The other was my language arts teacher. She was from Tennessee. I loved her accent, and the way she taught language arts methods. My biggest memory is of the teacher who influenced me the most, my dad . . . In the fall of 1981 I was taking 3 classes to get a reading endorsement. This was back in the days when no one needed them. Dad was pushing it as a way to make myself different from all the zillions of elementary ed majors. When I walked into class that week, I discovered I was the youngest and the only one without a college degree. Everyone else was going for their masters or PHD. Me, I was still an undergrad. I was so intimidated, that I did what I always did when in doubt…call dad. He was always honest. He said my classmates had an edge with degrees and work experience, but I had an edge too. I didn’t believe it till he explained. My only job was to be a student. Everyone else in those 3 classes was working. Most had families. Dad was right as usual! I got A’s in all 3 classes. My only B+ that semester was in an undergrad class. Go figure! I graduated on time in June of 1981, 3 classes shy of my reading endorsement. That endorsement was worth my time and money. My first job was half-time teaching Title I reading at Perry. From there I got my first full-time job teaching Title I at Gomer. I did 3 more years as a reading specialist before getting my dream job teaching 2nd grade. Today I’m sending out a big thank you to all my teachers who pushed me to be more, to have stronger skills. Those teachers may have been a pain, but they made me grow the most. They were, and still are my favorites! You never know who you’re going to meet at the Armstrong Air and Space Museum! This summer I ran into 2 former students. Carson was at the June space camp. He’ll be in 5th grade at Spencerville this year. Sorry, Carson, I forgot to get a picture! Carmen’s picture is above. She’s going into 6th grade at Elida. Go Dawgs go! I love seeing my ‘old’ students, and most of all I love them remembering me! Carmen was at the museum the day I manned the Zero Gravity trainer. When you think zero gravity, do you picture a satellite, or an astronaut in outer space? They’re both heavy! Neil’s suit weighed 188 pounds. It’d sink in water but float in outer space. The satellite is even heavier, but it floats too! Imagine that! Would you like to experience zero gravity? It’s not cheap! Going to the moon will cost $300-600 million per person. If a few friends chip in, you’d only pay $100 million each. Going into space is a little cheaper. In 2009 Guy Laliberte, owner of Cirque De Soleil, paid $35 million for a 12-day voyage to the international space station. Guy said it was worth every penny. Google said it’s about $10,000 per pound now to get you into space. If you weigh 100 pounds, that’s $100 million. Ouch! Time for a diet! See the people flying? They’re taking a plane ride with Zero-G for $4,950, plus 5% tax. $5450 gets you 15 parabolic maneuvers (one is shown in the graph above). Each one will last 20-30 seconds. BTW, a parabolic maneuver is like taking a roller coaster ride in and out of the atmosphere, into outer space. If you don’t like coasters, don’t go…its nickname is ‘The Vomit Comet.’ YUCK!! Speaking of roller coasters, how about this zero gravity ride? You can find at amusement parks like Cedar Point. Best of all, it’s cheap. Really! An all-day pass at Cedar Point is only $49. Let’s ride! But there’s something less expensive, the Armstrong Air and Space Museum zero gravity trainer. Adults can visit for $8 a day, $4 for kids. 5 and under is free. This is the zero gravity trainer. It works like a hover board. Carmen loved it! So did the kids from the Delaware summer program who spent the day at the museum. I was their zero gravity guide, but I felt a carnival worker. I kept the line moving so everyone got a turn, and those who loved it got seconds. If you visit the museum, here are my your zero gravity tips…Put a foot on the outside edge of the black hoses. Get comfortable. Someone from the museum will switch on the motor (it looks and sounds like a vacuum cleaner). Voila! You will be floating on air. Only by a couple inches, but you’ll still be floating! The bars help you push and pull your way around. I wonder how real astronauts move. A swim stroke?
When the ride’s over, stay put. Someone will switch off the motor, then you wait for the board to touch down. Want to go again? Just get in line! Come and enjoy! I was at the museum last week and met one of my old students. I got the idea to write about meeting her, and giving her a Zero Gravity ride. Her grandmother took 3 pictures. This was my favorite. I decided to zoom in on the two of us. I realized, as I pasted it into a word document, that I didn't have enough pictures or ideas, for a post. I went to Bing images to get more. I found this picture of the museum but I wanted more. I decided the new images should show gravity in action. Here's what I found: I decided to end with the original picture, but I still wasn't happy. I needed better pictures of the tray, the hoses, and the motor, so I could show and tell you how the zero gravity trainer works. Images found, I pasted them into a word document. It helps me see how I want to tell my story. Then I wrote the first draft. As I wrote, I thought about cost. I googled prices,. Zero gravity opportunities are not cheap! I’ve been editing that draft since Tuesday the 8th. Christopher, the museum educator, read it on Wednesday the 9th. Hooray! No content errors. I didn't finish editing my approved draft today, the 10th, so I put this post together. I already had this idea in a word document. I thought you'd like to see how a post is created. Would you believe I still spent 3-4 hours tonight editing it, prepublication? I want my writing to be just right! Tomorrow I'll finish editing the real post. I'll read and reread it until it's smooth and error-free. Just right! Finally, hopefully tomorrow, I'll go into Weebly. I'll cut the pictures and text from my word document, and I'll paste them into this program I'll proofread again, and again, till it's just right. Writing isn't easy! Then, finally, I'll click post. Hopefully, tomorrow night, you'll see the real post on rindabeach.com. Fingers crossed! |
AuthorWhen I write, I can only have one voice in my head, mine. A little noise is fine. But too much, or worse yet, WORDS, and I must change rooms or pull out headphones. Then I can write on! Categories
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