Queensbury third graders venture north to watch total solar eclipse

PLATTSBURGH, N.Y. — The solar eclipse that occurred on Monday, April 8 was the first time since 2017 a total solar eclipse passed over the United States, providing many the rare opportunity of visiting locations at which full totality would be visible.

Wanting to take advantage of this, as well as to provide a once-in-a-lifetime field trip for their students, Queensbury Elementary School teachers Kathy Edwards and Samantha Horowitz took their third-grade classes on a field trip to SUNY Plattsburgh — a location that would be in the line of totality.

The field trip had been in the works since fall of 2023, and with the help of parents as well as the Queensbury Elementary School PTSA and Principal Jessica Rossetti a charter bus, a buffet lunch and two classroom rentals at the university were able to be secured for the trip. Students, teachers and families were also able to purchase T-shirts designed by school art teacher Jen Spath to wear on the trip north and to commemorate the event.

“It’s really rewarding and just kind of a really cool feeling that it all went smoothly,” said Edwards, who was the driving force behind the trip. “It was so cool to hear the kids gasp and to experience what they had seen in all the videos leading up to today in person.”

Edwards also shared how it felt rewarding to hear the parents discuss how they didn’t realize how cool the event would be and to be able to provide this shared experience with the families since parents and siblings were able to attend as well, some riding the bus with the classes while others followed behind in their own cars.

Leading up to the solar eclipse, Edwards and Horowitz spent ample time preparing their students through readings, activities and videos to help inform them about what they would be seeing. The goal was to make the students aware of how special the solar eclipse was and to help them understand what was going to be going on so that they could make the most out of the event.

“It is such an awesome opportunity,” Horowitz explained. “We were so lucky that we got to bring our classes up to see it (the solar eclipse), and it’s cool because we get to combine the learning that we have done in the classroom with real-life learning and real-life experiences. It is really fun that we get to make those connections with these kids and get to experience this once-in-a-lifetime event together.”

Through the School of Education at SUNY Plattsburgh, a graduate student led the Queensbury group on a tour of the university so the third graders could see what a college campus looked like.

In the two reserved classrooms on campus, the students engaged in a variety of activities leading up to heading outside to view the natural phenomena including taking part in a read-aloud from a book about eclipses, creating entries in an “eclipse journal,” and doing solar eclipsed-themed crafts some of which they could then use outside during the eclipse.

“I’m excited for the solar eclipse,” third-grader Aria Younes said. “I’ve never seen one before and I get to see it with my teacher and friends. We’ve been learning a lot and I can’t wait to see it.”

Once outside on the field, the children were excited to put their glasses on to track the progress of the eclipse leading up to totality and be able to see the sun slowly disappear as the moon passed in front of it.

“I like the fact I can look at the sun,” Kip Freeman, one of the third graders, said. “The special lenses let me look at it. I guess this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and I was excited to get to see the sun being eaten by the moon.”

According to NASA, the next total solar eclipse will be on Aug. 12, 2026, with the path of full totality passing over Greenland, Iceland, Spain, Russia and a small area of Portugal. It won’t be until 2079 that a total solar eclipse will be visible from New York state.

“I think that an experience like this just really broadens the student’s experiences beyond just the town and what they know,” Edwards said regarding why field trips like this are so important. “We had to travel to go see it, so now the girls and boys are realizing that eclipses happen but don’t always happen nearby and I think it will kind of wet their appetite and in the future may look to where eclipses are and look into going to other places as well as what those places may be like.”