Phases of the Moon

When the sun goes down and it is time to go to bed, we can look out the window and see the moon. When we look up at the moon sitting next to the stars, sometimes it looks different! It can be nice and big and look like a baseball, or some nights we don’t see it at all! The moon is nice and bright when it is out because it reflects the light from the sun! This is what causes the different phases of the moon!

The different shapes of the moon is called The Phases of the Moon. The moon has many different phases!

The sun reflects light onto the moon which makes it shine so bright! This is what all the different phases look like!

One of the phases of the moon is called a Full Moon. This means that you can see the whole moon, and it looks like a baseball. This happens when the Moon is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun.

Another phase of the moon is called the Last Quarter or can also be called a half moon. This is when we can only see one half of the moon. This is because the Moon is next to the sun!

The next phase of the moon is called a New Moon. This is when we can not see the moon at all! This is because the moon is right in front of the sun, so the moon is not lit when it faces the Earth! The shining side is facing the sun, so when we can not see the moon it does not mean that it is not there!

The next phase of the moon is called the First Quarter which is also only half of the moon. This is because the moon is next to the sun again, but opposite from where it was during the Last Quarter! This means that the other side of the moon is shining!

Related Video from PBS Learning Media: https://pbslm-contrib.s3.amazonaws.com/WGBH/buac19/buac19-int-earthsunmoon35model/index.html 

This will allow for the students to drag the moon and see at the top of the screen what the moon looks like on earth depending on the position the moon is located.

Follow up activity/discussion Questions:

1. When rotating the moon around the earth, How did you observe the moon moved? (Answer after the PBS Learning Media Activity)

2. What happens when it is daytime in the United States? Where in the world would the moon be shining?

3. Can we make a model of the sun, moon and the earth in our classroom? If so lets try it!

My follow up activity is based off of the third discussion question, We will then make an interactive to scale demonstration of the sun, moon and the earth. We will do this activity by using a lamp as the sun, a white ball as the moon and a globe as the Earth. We can position the moon opposite the sun and the Earth located between the two, demonstrating a full moon. This will allow the students to physically see what happens when the moon rotates around the earth.

Related Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXe0yxzYkjo

This is a visual demonstration of what my book discusses this can be viewed either before or after the ebook reading.