Astronomy 1:4

Professor Zumwalt was ready before students began to show up at her door. They slowly filed in, and she smiled at each student, greeting those who names she finally had down and then figuring out the others by process of elimination. As the bell rang, she cleared her throat. "Hello, hello!" she said gaining the attention of the students. "Last week, I left you with a question. Has anyone looked up the answer, as to why the stars move across the sky at night?" Adorah looked around the class asking her students. She saw one hand raised in the class and pointed to the student. "The Earth is spinning so they move as the Sun does," the student replied. "Yes! Exactly right, 2 points to you," Professor Zumwalt said with a smile. "We are spinning in a small circle around what is called an axis, like this globe I have here in the front of the room." Professor Zumwalt gestured to a floating, spinning globe that sat to the side of her desk.

"We are also spinning in a large ellipse around the Sun. I'll define those words on the board in just a moment," Adorah said, noticing some of her students seemed confused by the words. "Standing on Earth, we are actually traveling very, very fast through space. Above us in the sky, the stars appear to be fixed on a giant sphere around us. This is called a celestial sphere," Professor Zumwalt said, pausing for a moment to let them catch up. "In truth, stars are various distances from us but for now we will look up and talk about them as though they are all on this sphere around us. This sphere would look very similar to the bubble I placed around us last week but with the other half. The Earth actually blocks our view at what is called the horizon, causing us to only see part of the celestial sphere."

"Last week, we saw the difference between 10 p.m. and 3 a.m. on the same day. Tonight we are going to go up... right now actually! You'll be able to see the sky at about 10 pm today about mid-November," Adorah said, hurrying the students to go up the stairs to the observatory deck. Once there, she began to speak again. "We talked about Vega last week, and Vega was roughly to the northwest, fairly close to the horizon." Professor Zumwalt pointed out the spot on the horizon the students would expect to see the star. However, the star wasn't there. In fact, she waved her wand, and then a magical line connected the dots, and the constellation Pegasus was visible there again.

"Two months ago, we would have needed to stay up well past your bedtimes in order to see our friend Pegasus, but now. at 10:14 p.m., he is visible to us. This is because of that giant path the Earth is taking around the Sun. To sum up the star movements in the sky, the stars will rise and set daily. They will also shift slowly based on the time of year it is, or rather, where we are on our path around the Sun. Now, let's head back downstairs!" She ushered the first years into the classroom, quickly making her way to stand back by her desk.

"We ran out of time this week! Next week, I'll have a list of words with their definitions that are so, so important to us. You'll need them to study. Once you've packed up, you're free to go to your dorms or to come and ask me questions if needed," Professor Zumwalt said, dismissing the class with a smile. She hoped they would be excited next week, for less lecturing and more looking at the nighttime sky.

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For full credit, RP the lesson.
First poster to answer the question will earn 2 house points.

 

[Freddie Lagowski]

Freddie always felt a bit smug flooing up to the north tower while his classmates made the long climb up through the castle. Well, he would rather have been able to climb with them; he would rather not be scared of falling; he would rather his leg didn't hurt; but he couldn't do anything about all that, so he just had to enjoy the little perks. He sat down and took out his notebook, barely having a chance to find a pen before Professor Zumwalt started talking. He didn't feel like answering the question today. People looking at him - he just didn't like it.

Aw, c'mon. Again? Freddie let his classmates go first, just in case anything bad happened on the stairs. It was usually fine, but a small chance of of his knee buckling half way up was enough to make him hold on to the wall like a baby. OK, he was good. It was a bit cold up on the deck. Freddie looked up at the clear sky, yawning into his sleeve. He would normally have been in bed ages ago. "Wow," he said quietly, as constellation lines appeared on the horizon. "How did she do that?" Could Freddie learn that spell? Maybe he could do it next time his family went camping - that would be awesome.

Freddie made his way carefully back down to the classroom, still thinking about stars. He was definitely gonna fall asleep as soon as he closed his eyes tonight.​

 

[Marina Vortalis]

Marina didn’t think she was ever really going to like Astronomy, but she did her best to try and not make that too obvious, especially since she wanted to do well in all of her classes. It felt like one of those things she should keep to her chest right now. She’d started writing a couple of letters to her mother over the last couple of weeks but she hadn’t managed to finish them. She never knew whether her mother got them or not, though she doubted it, not that she spoke about the reasons why. There was something about the way her dad looked at her whenever she asked that made her think maybe now. Marina had her hand up already when the professor asked about the question from last week. "The Earth is spinning so they move as the Sun does," she said as she took the notes she needed to, explaining the Earth’s rotation and all the stuff about the celestial sphere. She liked learning about the sky, because she liked to think it was the same where her mother was, even if they weren’t necessarily looking at the same stars. Maybe it wasn’t all that different really. She hoped not. She climbed slowly up to the observatory deck, watching Freddie as she went. She’d seen him trip during Halloween and she still didn’t know why, and whilst she thought he probably seemed fine, she tried to be discreet about watching him. When the class ended she quickly left for her own research on the sky.

@Freddie Lagowski​