The Moon
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Helper Harry will remind you of the strategies you should be using while reading
Main Idea Mandy will help you identify the main ideas in the text.
Details Doodly will help you identify the supporting detail in the text
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The Moon's Movement
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How does the moon shine?
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Phases of the Moon
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The Moon's Surface
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Conclusion
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The Moon's Movement
The moon travels in the sky in a similar pattern to how Earth does. The moon revolves around Earth in a closed path. The path it travels in is an ellipse shape orbit. The moon also rotates as it revolves around Earth. It takes 27.3 days to make a full revolution around Earth and a full rotation. That means that a full day on the moon is actually 27.3 days long.
How does the moon shine?
Even though the moon may appear like it is shining, it does not supply its own light. The moon's light is provided by the sun. The moon is seen at night because the sun's light is reflected off of the moon's surface. As the moon moves in the sky, it changes position and different shapes are produced depending on how much sunlight is able to reflect from its surface.
The Phases of the Moon
As the moon rotates and revolves around Earth, the amount of light able to be reflected from the sun changes. The cycle for these changes to take place is about a month long, as long as it takes the moon to revolve around Earth. The first phase is new moon. This is when we are not able to see the moon, because no sunlight is able to reach the moon's surface to produce a reflection. Then the moon appears to grow, or wax, as more and more sunlight is reflected on it each night. It changes from a waxing crescent, to first quarter, to waxing gibbous. Then halfway through the cycle, the entire moon is reflecting the sun's light and we have a full moon.
After the full moon occurs, the moon appears to get smaller as it reflects less sunlight. It changes to a waning gibbous, last quarter, then a waning cresent. It keeps appearing smaller until the cycle begins again at new moon.
The Moon's Surface
The moon's surface is difficult to see from here on Earth. If you look at it carefully you can see many dark spots. Sometimes people claim to see the face of a man on the moon or say that it looks like swiss cheese!
The dark spots are the moon are really craters. These craters are formed when objects in space hit the moon and leave an indentation on the surface. The moon does not have an atmosphere like we have on Earth. If objects in space enter Earth's atmosphere, they often burn up from friction before ever reaching the surface. There is nothing to protect the moon from the objects that are flying around, so it has many more craters. The moon also does not have any weathering from wind or water. This means that when a crater is put on the moon, it is going to stay there forever!
The moon is definitely an interesting and exciting place! Scientists continue to learn more and more about it to help us understand our planet and solar system. There is always more information to learn and discover!
