It was glorious!
The fruit trees are blooming, the breeze is soft, the sun is warm, the grass is growing.
I'm not sure schooling outside is the best idea. Outside is nothing but distractions. But on a beautiful day like today, inside is torture. As a teacher, I lose either way because they're not paying attention no matter where we school. So it doesn't hurt to go outside for awhile.
Maren and I are studying astronomy for science right now. We decided to start with the sun, move through the planets, then keep moving outward to the galaxy and beyond. We're studying the sun right now, and today we went outside and observed the sun through an old tele-photo camera lense of mine. It was pretty cool. We couldn't get it to the point where we could see sunspots. But, I have come to find out, sunspot activity has been at an extreme low for the past six months or so. No recorded sunspot activity since December of last year, and 2008 has been called the 'blankest' year of the space age for sunspot activity.
So maybe when Maren's in Junior High we'll be able to pull the lens out again and see sunspots.
Anyway, this is how it works:
1. Take an apple box and tape a piece of white paper on one end on the inside of the box.
2. Cut a hole in the opposite end of the box that is the size of the small end of whatever lens you choose to use. You can use a detachable camera lens, or one lens of a pair of binoculars, or a spotting scope. I use my big 80X200 zoom lense because it has a tripod mount on the lens, which makes it possible for me to mount it solidy on a tripod before proceeding to step 3:
3. With the open side of the box facing you, insert the small end of your lense of choice into the the hole in the box and point the lens/box contraption directly at the sun. WARNING!! DO NOT LOOK DIRECTLY AT THE SUN--ESPECIALLY THROUGH THE LENS!!!
You'll know when you have the sun directly in your lens when the circle of light that appears on your white paper is perfectly round. It takes some doing, but it is SO worth it. The image will be much less bright than the sun and easily observable without harm to your eyes.
4. You will probably see specks and spots projected on the paper that MAY be dust on the lens. You can tell if it's dust by turning the lens in the hole. If the spots and specks move, they're dust. If not, they're sunspots!
In my search for sunspot information, I found this fun Sunspot Plotter at SpaceWeather.com that will tell you what sunspot activity was like on any entered date going all the way back to 1755!
http://spaceweather.com/glossary/sunspotplotter.htm
Cool, huh?
How about THIS for cool:
This is an x-ray of the sun during LOW sunspot activity (Oct 2006):
And this is an x-ray of the sun during HIGH sunspot activity (1991):
WOW!
Nathan is very interested in all things space and has been since he was about 4 1/2. I'll have to show him these photos when he returns home from school. Thanks for sharing!
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