On June 8th, 2004 a celestial event of historical calculations of the distances to nearby stars, and the scientific importance will occur when the silhouette of use of transits to identify extra-solar planets will all add the planet once again crosses the face of the to the excitement of this cosmic occurrence. Sun as seen from the Earth. This event or last occurred in 1882, so no one alive today has To prepare you for this historic event, be sure to visit ever witnessed the transit of Venus. Through parallax the new Sun-Earth Day website to register for your free measurements, it allowed astronomers to define, for the educational packet. first time, a fairly accurate number for the astronomical http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/sunearthday unit (the distance from Earth to the Sun) and therefore, the distance to all the other known planets. Additionally, On-Line Programs for participation: the transit produced estimates of longitude location on • A web cast on March 19th, for Sun-Earth Day, the earth and provided the first evidence for an to prepare students, parents and museums atmosphere around Venus. for safe viewing of the transit of Venus • A real-time web cast on June 8th of the entire During the previous 1882 transit, expeditions were Transit starting at 1 AM (EDT) Tuesday and launched to all parts of the world to retrieve accurate ending 7:30 AM (EDT) parallax measurements. During the 2004 transit, • Online archives of Transit images taken by professional and amateur astronomers all over the amateur and professional telescopes from world will be waiting with sophisticated ground based across the globe telescopes, as well as spacecraft that will view the • Library of Congress and other historical transit in a myriad of frequencies. documents from past transits • Classroom math, geometry, reading and Sun-Earth Day 2004 has selected the transit of Venus science activities to study the Transit and the as this year s theme. Opportunities are available to scale of the solar system and universe based prepare for the viewing of the event. The website on the real-time data http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/sunearthday has been • ’Ask the Scientist’ chat rooms and email developed to provide the necessary resources and opportunities opportunities for participation in our fourth Sun-Earth • Solar Week, for students to learn about Day. This year s program will continue to offer new and careers in space science exciting space science content that will cross all of • NASA Connect tells about the transits and space sciences, offering activities and resources for scaling the solar system every classroom and museums event. The goal is to • Venus the Twin Planet involve as much of the student population and the • The Solar-Planetary Connection public in this event as possible and to help them • Student Parallax Observations understand the immense importance and excitement • Educational Activities surrounding this and previous transits. John Philip • Data Archive Sousa’s Transit of Venus March written in 1883 will also • Setting the Scale of the Solar System be re-performed for the first time in 120 years. Through • Research on planets and other stars engaging activities focused on US and world history, • Student Observation Network- sunspotters music, technology, math, and astronomy, classrooms view the transit and museums can create their own event or participate • ’s Transit of Venus March in one of the opportunities we make available. first re-performance Comparisons of Venus with Earth and ,

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Contact Information: Formal Education: Elaine Lewis [email protected] Informal Outreach: Sten Odenwald [email protected] Website/Multimedia: Troy Cline [email protected]