After weeks of anticipation, and sold out glasses at most stores around town, the big day had finally arrived.

Monday’s eclipse was celebrated all over Athens, including at all of the local schools. Chase Street Elementary School had a special, school-wide viewing event of their own.

The students and teachers spent the previous week studying the eclipse, learning why an eclipse happens, how often one occurs and how to properly view the eclipse.

The kids made pinhole cameras out of cardboard and screamed in excitement when they saw the crescent shaped shadows that shown through the cardboard during the eclipse.

They also learned the importance of wearing their eclipse glasses the whole time they were outside watching the eclipse.

A major concern for the viewing party was how teachers and volunteers were going to make sure the kids, especially the preschoolers and kindergarteners, didn’t remove their glasses while they looked up at the sky that day.

The preschool classrooms decided to take their students out in groups of three for just a few minutes at a time during the event, while showing NASA’s footage of the eclipse from points of totality in the classrooms.

The kindergarteners took a different approach to glasses safety. They combined their glasses and paper plates to make it harder for the glasses to fall off of their faces, and to lessen the temptation of slipping off their glasses.

No matter how the eclipse was viewed, the reactions were the same: the eclipse was awesome.

The kids would scream and yell every time they looked up and saw the wonders of the eclipse.

They laid on their backs with their friends, putting their heads together and pointing up in amazement at the sky.

You can view a slideshow of pictures from the day’s event here.

You can also see what the students had to say about the eclipse here.