What a wonderful solar outreach experience! .. the whole experience was one of the best in the past many years of my public observing sessions. Maroof Mian and Ali Khan were kind enough to accompany me on the occasion.
"Lahore Grammar School' Johar Town Branch is one of the best in lahore and the students i interacted with, proved it well. I started out by giving a 30 minutes lecture on the basics of Sun and what they will view from an hydrogen alpha telescope, using a keynote presentation in the school hall. The target audience were six classes of grade 5.
Then moved out to the football ground where Ali Khan and Maroof Mian helped me out with setting up Lunt 60 on Celestron VX mount. It just took me minutes to polar align the mount and see the sun in the eyepiece. Stephen Ramsden, founder of 'Charlie Bates Solar Astronomy Project' has been very kind and has sent me hundreds of 'Solar Glasses' absolutely FREE, which i took with me there at LGS along with a cool poster.
Each class came with a teacher.. I first gave them Solar Glasses and when they saw the sun.. they got so excited: "AALAA (meaning: super awesome).. WOW.." Some jumped on their feet with joy :) Then i told them that these glasses are sent from Stephen of CBSAP which is in USA. They said to please convey their thanks to them.. so thank you CBSAP from all those fifth graders!
In the end, students' science club gave me a hand made and a very beautiful 'thank you' card with all the members' signatures.. sweet :)
Thank you for coming on such short notice Maroof Mian and helping me in the very exciting solar viewing session. Special thanks to Ali Khan for staying with me till the end and explaining many students at the telescope how to observe better. Thank you Science teacher Mrs Shaista Irfan and other LGS folks for making this event such a success!
