On Thursday morning, Jaye Smittick gathered three families outside the McDonald Observatory to kick off its second-ever homeschool day.
“If you have any questions along the way, feel free to ask me,” Smittick told the homeschoolers. “Sorry, adults, but kids ask the best questions.”
Ana Gallegos, who traveled more than an hour from Pecos with her three children, said events like this can be hard to find in rural Texas.
“You have to be searching,” she said. “We do other events like in the state park. They have homeschool days also.”
The event started off at the Hobby-Eberly Telescope, one of the largest in the world, where Smittick gave the group of 14 a personal tour.
“So we’re basically looking for aliens,” Smittick explained. “The other thing we’re looking for with this telescope is we’re looking at galaxies that are 10 billion light-years away.”
» MORE: A special Texas Standard broadcast from the McDonald Observatory
Students like Mirely didn’t hesitate to ask big questions.
“Where does it come from?” she asked.
“Where does it come from? The galaxy?” clarified Smittick.
“Yes,” Mirely said.
“The galaxy has been there for we’re thinking the whole time the universe has been alive,” Smittick said. “It’s about 14 billion years.”
“You can work here when you get older,” Smittick told the homeschoolers during the tour of the Hobby-Eberly Telescope.
Sean Saldana / Texas Standard
The second stop of the day was at the visitor center exhibit hall, where Smittick grabbed a bag filled with a basketball, volleyball, softball, baseball and several marbles and handed them out. Each item represented a planet in the solar system, and students were tasked with lining up in the correct order from the sun.
“Let’s look at some facts about Uranus,” Smittick read from a book as the kids were getting oriented. “Uranus is blue because his feelings are hurt, being the butt of many jokes.”
Children had fun organizing themselves in the order of the planets.
Sean Saldana / Texas Standard
For the final event of the day, Smittick took the kids into the observatory’s classroom and gave them coloring sheets of different planets. Students then cut out their drawings and turned them into holiday ornaments.
“I picked Mars,” said student Jasiel. “Cause I like red.”
Smittick has been in their current role for just over a year, and one of their goals is to expand offerings like this, especially for other teachers.
Smittick spent much of the craft time cutting out drawings for the students in attendance.
Sean Saldana / Texas Standard
Five times a year, the observatory offers similar workshops to educators who drive in from all parts of the country.
“We usually get a lot of Texas teachers,” they said, “but we have had a couple from New York and Virginia and things like that.”
Like the universe itself, programming at the McDonald Observatory is ever expanding.
