Central Middle School students intrigued by solar eclipse

Gavin Jay’s already done the math for the next time he’ll see a solar eclipse.

“I’ll be 31 the next time it happens,” Jay said, peeking at the sky Monday as he and hundreds of his classmates stood in and around the soccer field of Central Middle School, watching the eclipse that at its peak blocked about 90 percent of the sun in this portion of the state. “It looks cool!”

That was exactly what Central science teacher Barbara Henry had in mind when she planned the viewing for the students at her school. Principal Skeeter Sampler said the school prepared for the big day by ordering hundreds of the solar glasses that allow the viewer to look directly at the sun so you can watch the moon’s shadow gradually cover it. Sampler said the students who were participating were let out of class about 1:20 p.m. to head for the soccer field, where a mass of young bodies stood looking up at the sky (don’t worry Mom; they were wearing their glasses), while some others lounged on the ground or laid on their backs to view the sky.

While some were running and chasing each other — hey, it’s spring, it was a nice day, they were outside — a majority took a look at the sky, most multiple times.

“Wear your glasses. Don’t get blind,” one student yelled at his friend.

Nayeli Reyes, an eighth grader standing with her friend Valerie Schrock, said that Monday wasn’t her first solar eclipse.

“I saw the one in 2017 with my dad,” she said, adding this one was just as exciting to witness. “It was” — she looked at Schrock for a word they both could agreed on — “intriguing.”

Schrock said she was interested in how animals would react, with both explaining students and teachers had done some research on the eclipse and knew an event that mimicked dusk (or night, if you were lucky) had the same effect on animals that darkness would.

“It’s cool how they react,” Schrock said.

Seventh grader Natalia Oritz said she was happy with the opportunity to watch the eclipse in person.

“I think it’s cool, to be out here to see it,” she said, adding while students knew what to expect “it was different to see it.”

Henry said she wanted students to treat the eclipse as an event, one they would remember for the rest of their lives — or at the very least, until they might have an opportunity to see their next one in 20 years. She said the whole idea was to get students to participate in a natural event that doesn’t happen often.

“I want them to look at their place in time,” Henry said. “It’s something they may not see for the rest of their lives.”