March 21, 2006

Dear Fellow Researchers,

We are students from Mackinnon Middle School. Our names are Diana, Rachel, Lenny, and Brian. Our teacher’s names are Mr. McGrail, and Mrs. Leary. We are measuring the circumference of the earth. We are using the sun’s rays, a meter stick, a protractor, a marker, a long piece of paper, a shadow, a central angle, and a plumb line. This is how we are doing our Noonday project.

Eratosthenes is one of first people to measure the circumference of the earth with just a stick and a rock. He lived in Greece when he was young. When he was measuring the circumference of the earth he got information from the library at Alexandria. He went to Athens school when he was six years old. In the school they had no desks, no paper, no pencils, and no girls were allowed to go to the school. Eratosthenes was a genius, and when he was thirty years old he went to Alexandria. Alexandria only accepted you if you were really smart. When Eratosthenes first tried to measure the circumference of the earth he did many different things. He tried to walk the measure from one town to another, but it didn’t work because he was not always walking at the same speed. Or he was not always taking the same size steps.

After we did the project, we found out your school is 309 miles from here. Our group got a total of 35 degrees, but our class voted on a total of 40 degrees. We think that this project was fun and exciting, and we hope you had a good time too! Thank you for taking the time to read this letter,

From,

Diana, Rachel, Lenny, and Brian