On April 8, 2024, a broad swath of North America—including parts of Mexico, the U.S. and Canada—will experience a total solar eclipse. It will be an awesome experience for people of any age, as well as an educational one for kids.
It’s easy to get lost in celestial mechanics, though, so here’s a guide to help you explain the upcoming total solar eclipse to kids both accurately and clearly.
[Related: Here Are the Best Places to View April’s Solar Eclipse]
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1. Explain What a Solar Eclipse Is
Your explanation of this April’s eclipse can vary in complexity, depending on the age of the child. “At its very simplest, when the moon gets in between the Earth and the sun, and the moon appears to pass over the sun as seen from Earth, then we get a solar eclipse,” says Michelle Nichols, director of public observing at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago. “If the moon partially covers the sun, we call it a partial solar eclipse. If it completely covers the sun, we call it a total solar eclipse.”
For young kids, this might be explanation enough. Older ones might have follow-up questions. For example, doesn’t the moon pass between the Earth and the sun every month? That’s what a new moon is, right?
That’s true. But the moon’s orbit around Earth is not completely lined up with our planet’s orbit around the sun. The orbit of the moon is tilted by about five degrees, says Jackie Faherty, an astrophysicist and senior education manager at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. Normally, that tilt means that when the moon moves between Earth and the sun, the three bodies are out of alignment. The moon doesn’t block the sun, and the shadow of the moon cast by the sun lands in…
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