February 29, 2012
Welcome to Writing Wednesday and Happy Leap Day! Every week there is a new opportunity to publish your own creative writing on the Seymour Science blog. This week, we are asking you to use your writing to help your friends understand Leap Year.
The Facts:
A leap year is a year when an extra day is added at the end of the month of February. This happens approximately every four years.
We have a leap year because a standard year is not actually exactly 365 days long - it’s 365.2422 days long. That is the number of days that it takes our planet Earth to make a full rotation around the sun. A long time ago - 46 B.C. exactly - the Roman emperor Julius Caesar realized that we had a problem. If we kept counting the year as only 365 days, that leftover .2422 days would start to add up. Gradually, over hundreds of years, our calendar would slip, until we’d be having a summery month like July happen in winter.
So, Julius Ceasar brought in a group of scientists who figured out that if we added a day every four years, we would keep our seasons on track. This became known as the Julian calendar, which pretty much the whole world still uses today.
Your assignment: Write a paragraph explaining Leap Year to your fellow Earthlings!
How to make your writing powerful: Read and re-read the three paragraphs above. What are the most important details to include if you are explaining Leap Year to someone? Which words do you think are important to include?
When you are finished writing, click on the yellow "Comments" at the bottom of this post to enter your writing. Happy Leap Day!
Use your Extra Leap Day to learn about the Solar System with Seymour Science! 30% off planetary eBooks until March 2nd for all Earthlings!
Posted by: Liz Nealon
