EQ: What causes the moon’s phases, solar eclipses, and lunar eclipses? Chapter 3 Lesson 2 EQ: What causes the moon’s phases, solar eclipses, and lunar eclipses?

Vocabulary Crater Phase Lunar eclipse Solar eclipse

What is the moon like? The moon appears to be the largest, brightest object in the sky. The moon does not make its own light, it reflects the light of the sun. Moonlight is reflected sunlight.

Moon and earth The moon is Earth’s closest neighbor in space. https://www.brainpop.com/science/space/moon/ Moon and earth The moon is Earth’s closest neighbor in space. It is about 240,000 miles from Earth. This is almost 400 times closer to Earth than the sun.

Moon and facts http://space-facts.com/the-moon/ Rocks on the moon are similar to rocks on earth. The moon is much smaller than Earth and there is no air, no atmosphere and no water. Because of this, the moon has extreme ranges of temperatures. In the daytime, it is hot enough to boil water. The nights are colder than anyplace on Earth. There is definitely not life on the moon and it doesn’t taste like cheese.

Surface features The moon has tall mountains and flat plains. Most of it is covered in craters. A crater is a hollow area or pit in the ground. Large rocks called meteoroids make the moon’s craters. Meteoroids travel through space and crash into other objects.

Craters and earth’s atmosphere If meteoroids are always crashing around, why aren’t they in earth’s atmosphere? Earth’s atmosphere keeps them away. When they come close to the atmosphere, they become very hot and burn up before they hit earth’s surface.

Phases of the moon The earth revolves around the sun and the moon revolves around earth. The moon completes one revolution around earth in just 29 days. This is almost as long as a month.

pHASES https://www.flocabulary.com/unit/moon-phases/

Apparent shapes As the moon orbits (revolves) earth, its appearance seems to change. The apparent shapes of the moon in the sky are called phases. During one revolution, the moon cycles through all of its phases. All of this time. The sun is shining. It lights one half of the moon at a time and the other half is dark. During the moon’s orbit, we see different parts of its lighted half.

Moon clip https://www.brainpop.com/science/space/moonphases/

Moon’s gravity and tides The moon has gravity and it pulls slightly on earth. The moon pulls more than the sun because it is closer to earth. The moon’s gravity also causes tides. Tides are the rise and fall of the ocean’s currents. Most places on earth have high and low tides.

eclipses An eclipse is a shadow cast by earth or the moon. Lunar eclipse: earth casts a shadow on the moon. This happens when earth is directly between the sun and the moon. solar Eclipse: the moon casts a shadow on earth. This happens only during a new moon.

ECLIPSE SONG https://www.flocabulary.com/unit/eclipses/