Equinox Myths

The reason for the seasons

Do you teach seasons? It’s not normally part of my curriculum, but I always spend a day un-teaching equinox myths. There’s a lot of misunderstanding out there. Here are the things my students claim are true, until I straighten them out.

Equinox Myths:

• You can balance an egg on the equinox.Well, technically, yes, you can. But not because of any weird gravity thing or whatever is going around these days. You can balance an egg every day. Don’t believe me? Try it today, and then try it again in a few weeks. Let me know what you learn.
• You can balance a broom on the equinox. Again, yes you can. And, again, you can do this every day if you’re patient enough to try.
• There is no shadow at noon on the equinox. I don’t know where this one came from, and it is so demonstrably false (unless you happen to be exactly on the equator at the exact moment that the sun is directly overhead) that it surprises me when it comes up every year.
• The equinox is the whole day. It’s actually just a split second – the exact moment when the Sun passes over the equator.
• The equinox is the day when the amount of dark equals the amount of light. This one is possibly true, depending on how you define “dark” and “light” relative to sunrise and sunset. It’s also dependent on your distance from the equator.

What equinox myths do you have to un-teach?