Over the next 10 days, we are heading towards the darkest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.
December 21, 2024 will be the darkest day of the year when, in Vermont, we will have only 8 hours and 49 minutes of daylight. Our last solstice was on June 21, when we had over 15 hours of light.
There are many holidays around the world that occur on or near the winter solstice. We will be using the next few days to learn about some of them.
Solstice Math
- We’re going to start by building a shadow tracker. Click here for instructions.
- Next we’re going to use our shadow tracker and a flashlight to figure out how the ancients calculated when the Solstice was going to happen. Click here to see how the math works.
- Finally, we’ll warm up with some cocoa and read a bit about the history of Winter Solstices before taking a quick look at some of the ways people have celebrated the solstice: