Seventh-grade student Henry Cohen bounced side to side in time to the Beatles' "Here Comes the Sun" playing in teacher Nancy Morris' classroom, swinging his arms open and closed across the planets pictured on his T-shirt. Henry and other classmates at Cleveland's Riverside School were on their feet, dancing during a session of activities tied to April's total solar eclipse. Second-graders invited in for the lessons sat cross-legged on the floor, laughing as they modeled newly decorated eclipse viewing glasses. Dioramas with softball-sized model earths and moons and flashlight "suns" occupied desks and shelves around the room. Henry said his shirt reflected his love of space, which he called "a cool mystery." The eclipse, he said, "is a one in a million chance and I'm glad I get to be here for it." For schools in or near the path of totality of the April 8 eclipse, the event has inspired lessons in science, literacy and culture. Some schools also are organizing group viewings for students to experience the awe of daytime darkness and learn about the astronomy behind it together. A hair out of the path of totality, the school system in Portville, New York, near the Pennsylvania line, plans to load its 500 seventh- through 12th-grade students onto buses and drive about 15 minutes into the path, to an old horse barn overlooking a valley. There, they will be able to trace the shadow of the eclipse as it arrives around 3:20 p.m. EST. It required rearranging the hours of the school day to remain in session, but Superintendent Thomas Simon said staff did not want to miss out on the learning opportunity, especially at a time when when students experience so much of life through screens. "We want them to leave here that day feeling they're a very small part of a pretty magnificent planet that we live on, and world that we live in, and that there's some real amazing things that we can experience in the natural world," Simon... |