Perservering at the National Science Teachers Association

By Charles Fulco

Last month I attended and presented at the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) national conference in Nashville, which just happens to be the largest city within the path of next year’s totality. I was excited at this educational trifecta opportunity: a chance to visit “Music City,” and take in all the entertainment, food and history that Nashville offers; to present at a national teaching event and talk with science teachers who will witness a total eclipse; and to visit Nashville’s Adventure Science Center and Vanderbilt University’s observatory.

My first day at the conference started optimistically but ended frustratingly: armed with solar glasses and information to distribute to my peers, I chose to attend workshops that focused on: a) science literacy techniques, b) using social media to promote science, or c) learning how to submit scientific articles for publication. All were good workshops, and I made some useful contacts, but when approaching teachers afterward to discuss TSE2017 with them, I got many blank looks and replies of “I had no idea there was an eclipse coming to this area.” At that point, I knew I’d have to get into serious outreach mode over the next several days in order to generate significant awareness among my colleagues.

By the end of Day 1, I resigned myself to the fact that virtually all the science teachers made contact with that day were not aware of the eclipse, and—worse yet—some didn’t even seem to care. It’s one thing to talk to the general public and get mixed reactions and uninterested replies, but when it comes from one’s own peers, that was difficult for me to accept. My thought was, “if they don’t know (or care), how will their students?” Obviously, some work needed to be done on Day 2.

Packing more solar glasses, my Coronado solar scope, GreatAmericanEclipse.com stickers and a short video on my phone, I set up shop in the large common areas of the Music City Center, a vast space with over 10,000 teachers on hand. That seemed to work well, thanks to free handouts and a sunny day, where many teachers took a few seconds to directly and safely observe the Sun with both scope and glasses. As with students, nothing gets more reaction and interest than a hands-on lesson!

Feeling much better about things, I visited the vendors area and stopped by to say hello to the Celestron folks, where I traded my freebies for a door prize ticket. And what a door prize I won—a brand new Evolution 6 telescope and tripod! I promised them right there that it would accompany me on all my outreach trips over the coming months (I kept my promise—it saw first light this week at a local event with students observing the Sun through the scope and learning about eclipses).

By the time of my presentation Saturday morning, things were definitely looking up, and by the time my workshop ended, my classroom of teachers accompanied me outdoors to view the Sun, at which point many more passers-by joined us. Not one pair of glasses was left, cards were exchanged, and many more teachers now know what to expect next summer, and how to prepare themselves and their students for TSE2017.

My last day in Nashville was spent at the Adventure Science Center and its Sudekum Planetarium, where I was invited to take part in an afternoon sky-show. I distributed the last of my solar glasses to the visitors (again, as with the NSTA teachers, there was virtually zero eclipse awareness among the public as well). After that, I stopped by Vanderbilt’s Dyer Observatory, atop a hill overlooking the city. The director, Rocky Alvers, and his staff were wonderful and thorough hosts, showing me the many instruments and artifacts (some from the 19th Century and earlier) on view. One fascinating stop was the “camera obscura” cave, where sunlight let in from a small hole atop the earthen dome focused a 360-degree inverted image of the surroundings onto the darkened walls of the cave. The good news from this visit: The Dyer is very much on top of the eclipse and will be doing solid outreach over the coming year.

As I was flying home, I realized the point of this experience: don’t let an initial feeling of frustration or disappointment get in the way of instruction and outreach. If I had let my feelings from Day 1 persist, not nearly as many teachers would be aware now, so don’t ever give up!

Science education and the Great American Eclipse

By Charles Fulco

As a science teacher, it  continually frustrates me to see what teaching and learning has evolved to in the US. Current educational lingo comprises terms like "Common Core," "Next Generation Science Standards," and "Flipped Classroom," and although I have been teaching to these goals for the past several years, I'm still not quite sure about where this is all going. Do we really need 27 different ways (no lie!) to teach ratios? Are shortcuts to deriving an answer really bad? Does every math answer need to be in the form of an extended ELA response? Is "6 r2" more descriptive than writing "6 1/3"? Has the learning pendulum finally swung too far?

"Every year it gets worse" is what I and other teachers say, and very few will argue that point. Students seem more distracted, teachers more frustrated, administrators more cow-towing, and parents angrier at the whole system than ever before.

In 1957 the world celebrated the International Geophysical Year (IGY), the goal being a renewed understanding of, and interest in the natural world. This coincided with the launch of Sputnik and the formation of NASA one year later. It was the age of atomic submarines and passenger jets, of microwaves and videophones. We were watching the Jetsons. In the short dozen years from 1957 to 1969, we went from small boosters exploding on launch pads to the behemoth Saturn V taking Armstrong and Aldrin to their first steps on the Moon. And during this time many products were invented that we now can't imagine living without. And at the foundation of this greatest decade of achievement was what the astronauts called "Go Fever"--the belief that no goal was too unreachable, no idea too far-fetched. The self-fulfilling prophesy kicked in. 

As a child and student in elementary school, I felt this national confidence as well, when our teachers would take us from class into the auditorium or cafeteria to watch a liftoff or splashdown, or when my mother let me stay home from school to watch an Apollo EVA on TV. Or when we were actually shown by our scoutmaster how to make an eclipse viewer so we could watch the 1970 eclipse outdoors and not on television. All of those events were touchstones for me, and remain the main reasons I fell in love with the natural sciences, especially astronomy.

How many students can say this today? Are there any similar events now that inspire our young learners to achieve great things? Is there an Apollo moonwalk for this generation? An IGY? I say yes, there is: The Great American Eclipse of 2017. I have every hope that it will do for today's students what those awe-inspiring events did for me many years ago. And now the challenge for me as an educator is to make sure that happens. 

Educating the educators

By Charles Fulco

The next several weeks will be exciting ones for me, as I’ll be stopping at Charleston, S.C., Greenbelt, Md., and Chicago, all with the goal of generating increased awareness of 2017’s Total Solar Eclipse. In each case, I’ll be talking with very different groups: in Charleston, the Visitors and Convention Bureau; in Greenbelt, NASA Education; and in Chicago, the National Science Teachers’ Assoc.’s national conference and students, teachers and administrators at two high schools.

Each meeting is exciting and challenging in its own way. I set up an appointment this Monday with the Charleston bureau after meeting two greeters at the welcome center at Lake Marion (which is within the path of totality) while driving down to Florida last month. I was glad to hear they were were aware of the forthcoming event, but one thought it would be dark “for two or three days.” OK, time to call the Visitors’ Bureau! Unfortunately, the level of awareness was even less there, as I quickly realized on the phone. The good news is, after hearing of the impending onslaught of crowds and the need to accommodate their needs, as representatives of their city, they recognized the seriousness of being unprepared for a total eclipse and asked me for assistance, which I gladly offered. I’m hoping that after Monday, I’ll have an ongoing relationship with the bureau, offering the resources of my colleagues and websites such as GreatAmericanEclipse.com

Tuesday’s meeting with NASA/Greenbelt will be a different story--I’ll be meeting with staffers already aware and preparing for the big event in 2-1/2 year’s time, devising strategies to better prepare school districts and municipalities on not only how to safely observe the eclipse, but to make certain students and the general public are not scared into remaining indoors, reduced to watching the beautiful spectacle of a total solar eclipse on television or their smart phones.

Out in suburban Chicago, I’ll be directly teaching to astronomy classes at a couple high schools in Naperville, Ill. Both are excellent schools with robust curricula, which makes me feel optimistic about the success I’ll have there. With schools, the most difficult part of teaching about solar eclipses isn’t getting through to the students; rather, it’s getting the message through to administrators that yes, there are safe ways to view them and you don’t need to pull the classroom blinds and lock the doors to prevent students from being outdoors and being blinded by the eclipse (which seems to be the prevailing view of these school bosses). And these are people with doctorates after their names!

And finally, at the NSTA’s national conference in Chicago, I’ll be spreading the word there as well, but this time to my teaching colleagues. I’m curious as the awareness level among the national cross-section of science instructors there. My greatest concern is that with the advent of new science standards and teaching responsibilities, less time will be spent on preparing students for this eclipse, and how ironic is that?

Stay tuned for my follow-up report. I’m hoping that the work I’ve been putting into “eclipse awareness” will start reaping results. No one said this would be easy!

Eclipse shades

By Charles Fulco

Before I left New York to attend the Solar Eclipse Conference in New Mexico (see posting below), I distributed solar shades (courtesy of Elaine Lewis at NASA) to many of my students who were interested in watching the small partial event that would be visible from the East Coast on October 23rd. While the weather was perfect for us in the southwest, it was unfortunately cloudy and rainy for most back home, but a few fortunate students did catch glimpses of the small notch in the Sun as it set in the west. Luckily, I had mailed several shades to my family members in other parts of the country, and they were able to see the eclipse as well.

Luckily I was traveling with a couple dozen shades as well, so I began giving them out to people I met along my trip—pilots, flight attendants, baggage attendants, rent-a-car employees, my seatmates on the plane. All of them were excited to receive them and if we were outdoors, they immediately began to use them. A couple of sharp-eyed ones saw the huge sunspot grouping that was front and center on the Sun that week—in fact, that was my first time seeing naked-eye sunspots myself.

I left my email address with some of the people I gave glasses to, so they could write back with their views of the eclipse that Thursday. To my delight, I received several emails, all telling me what a wonderful view they had and how thankful I gave them the shades. This warmed my educator’s heart, and also gave me hope that people WILL get pumped up for the big one in 2017. Based on the excitement level of the emails and of those I watched in person using the glasses, I’m now certain that even people who won’t be in the path of totality will still have a rewarding and exciting view of the partial stages.

The photo here was taken in Patagonia at the 2010 total solar eclipse, during the partial stage. You can clearly see the fat crescent of the Sun viewed through my friend’s eclipse glasses. I remember telling those around me to make certain they removed their shades as totality hit. I’ve heard stories of people leaving them on during totality and missing it completely, and I didn’t want  that to happen there!

Even those of us in Sunspot, New Mexico watching the eclipse with our scopes and binoculars still found time to glance up using the inexpensive shades. I guess it was the thrill of seeing that amazing sunspot group without magnification, or maybe just the fun of seeing an eclipse using our own eyes, without any optical help. I hope this is the case at every solar eclipse to come, where millions of people, young and old, with nothing more than their solar glasses, will simply go outside and look up, and enjoy the spectacle taking place above them.

TSE2017 & education in the U.S.

Michael mentioned in the postscript to my first blog entry that I am a science teacher on sabbatical this school year, dedicated to generating awareness and knowledge of the 2017 eclipse. This is true, but as I visit different school districts, I am realizing that there is so much more to be addressed: I also need to assess and learn how students, teachers, administrators, parents and even local governments and communities can work together to improve the state of education in the U.S.

Being a professional educator for almost 20 years (and a student before that), I have seen the curriculum pendulum make many arcs, never staying in place too long because there is always something “better” on the way, at least in the minds of education departments, state governors and in Washington. And with each new paradigm shift (as they say in education) comes its own jargon, buzzwords, and learning strategies that are presumed to be superior to what came before. “No Child Left Behind,” “IDEA ’97,” “STEM,” and “Common Core” are but a few of the terms to describe our nation’s continuing urge to find the best way for teachers to teach and for students to learn.

But what I’m finding instead is growing frustration among all parties involved--teachers are confused about what is required of them; our students are performing poorly compared to other countries; administrators are coming down hard on teachers; parents are angry at the entire system; and the government thinks this can all be remedied with new and different learning straegies and increased teacher accountability.

The fundamental problem I’m encountering is a lack of foundation of the basics among both students and teachers. And by “basics,” I really mean just that: Where does the sun go when it sets? Why do the Sun, Moon and stars seem to move across the sky? Why does the Moon change shape every day? Why do we sometimes see the Moon during the day and sometimes not at night? What causes solar and lunar eclipses? And that’s just astronomy--now apply that across all content areas, and you begin to see what we are up against.

Yet, ironically, much of the public does want to learn more about science. I see it all the time when I host outdoor astronomy sessions with a telescope. The oohs and aahs and questions last all evening, and many times, it’s the adults who are most intrigued and astonished by what they’re looking at, more so than the students, and I have an idea why (but that’s for another entry).

Another irony: the seeming paradox of having the most information available to us, at any hour of the day, delivered virtually instantaneously to our eyes, yet we seemingly know less about the outside world and its workings than our forebears did at the turn of the last century. I have been reading the wonderful publications found on this site from this and other centuries’ authors, and what a great working knowledge they had of the celestial mechanics involved with the occurrences and predictions of eclipses. And the writing! Descriptive and flowing and so much better than anything anyone is writing today about eclipses. I got chills reading James Fenimore Cooper’s account of the 1806 total eclipse that he and his fellow villagers observed together.

It is my hope that the schools I visit this year want to learn more about what will happen less than three years from now, even though TSE 2017 will most likely not be a specific addition to their curricula. And it is also my hope that these same schools will allow their students to watch it where they should be watching it from: outside of the classroom.

You gotta see totality!

My friend holding her eclipse shades to see the setting sun about halfway eclipsed during the 2010 TSE in El Calafate, Patagonia, Argentina

I'm Charles Fulco--science teacher, planetarium director and "eclipse chaser" (more properly known as an "umbraphile"). As a kid, my first contact with an eclipse was a good one, a near miss at 96% over my hometown of Port Chester, NY in March 1970. It was enough to make the sky noticeably dim, but unfortunately not totally dark. 

Had I known then what I know now, I would have done whatever it took to convince my mother to drive us to Virginia to witness the eclipse in its totality. But, no, instead I watched it on our living room TV. My mother, like every other parent in the country, listened to Bill Cosby and other celebrities who told everyone, via public service announcements, to stay inside and watch the eclipse on television. I remember feeling cheated afterward. And I realize now that I was—we all were. Warnings by school officials, teachers, and even comedians (!) about "eclipse rays” given off by the Sun and cautionary tales of people going blind just by being outside meant we all missed the opportunity to see one of the most amazing phenomena imaginable. "Stay inside and close the blinds!" they warned. So of course we did. They didn’t know there was a safe way to view this incredible event.

It was another 21 long years before I had another chance to see a total eclipse, and it also happened to be the longest totality until 2132, so I was extra fortunate. I watched the “Big One” live from a beach near Mazatlan, Mexico. To this day, I believe it was the most magnificent and eerie and miraculous thing I have ever experienced. Since that eclipse, I've been lucky enough to be under the Moon's shadow three more times (on three different continents). Each was beautiful and each was different.

Anyone who has seen a total solar eclipse knows there is no comparison between watching an eclipse on television and seeing one live with your own eyes. On August 21, 2017, we will have an opportunity in the US to view another total solar eclipse, this one beginning in Oregon and cutting a path across the country to South Carolina. Most of the population of the United States is within a day’s drive to the path of totality.  And this is why a group of concerned scientists and educators have begun a program of outreach to dispel myths, correct "bad science," promote safe observing methods, and mostly tell everyone to "get your ass to totality!" You’ll be hearing a lot from us in the next 2 years and 11 months.

Close up of the sunset total solar eclipse over Patagonia

Michael Zeiler has generously let me have this space on his Great American Eclipse website to talk about education and the eclipse. I look forward to sharing ideas, lesson plans and everything else that teachers, students, school officials, and entire communities can do to prepare for this nationwide event. Thanks for stopping by!

Editor's note: This is the first of a series of contributions by Charles. He is a teacher on a sabbatical dedicated to developing educational plans to inspire young people to see the total solar eclipse of 2017. If you have stories to share or ideas for education, leave them in the comments section below.