Moon

Moon

1. What causes the moon to shine?

The moon doesn't shine by itself, the light from the sun is reflected off it.

2. Why does the moon appear to change shape during the course of a month?

The sunlight hits it at different angles. When the Sun is behind us the moon looks fuller, when the sun is off to the side you see about half the disk, with the Sun out beyond the Moon you see just a sliver or even less.

3. What is an eclipse?

An eclipse occurs when one object gets in between you and another object and blocks your view. From Earth, we routinely experience two kinds of eclipses, an eclipse of the Moon and an eclipse of the Sun.

4. How is a solar eclipse different than a lunar eclipse?

A lunar eclipse occurs at night and a solar eclipse occurs during the day. There are only certain times when either of them can occur. A lunar eclipse can only occur when the moon is directly opposite the Sun in the sky/a full moon. Even though there is a full moon each month, obviously a lunar eclipse does not occur on a monthly basis because the Sun isn't exactly in line with the Earth and the moon. The moon's orbit is actually tilted 5 degrees more than that of the Earth. Otherwise, we would see a lunar eclipse each month.

5. Why isn’t there a solar eclipse and a Lunar eclipse each month?

The reason for why we don't have solar and lunar eclipses every month is because the Earth and moon's orbit, or revolution, is always tilted 5 degrees in some direction, meaning up or down, and so, the Sun, Moon, and Earth are not aligned. When aligned, it causes a solar or lunar eclipse.

6. What causes the tides?

The moon's gravitational force pulls on water in the oceans so that there are "bulges" in the ocean on both sides of the planet. The moon pulls water toward it, and this causes the bulge toward the moon. The bulge on the side of the Earth opposite the moon is caused by the moon "pulling the Earth away" from the water on that side.

Reasons for Seasons

Guiding Question: How does the tilt of the Earth’s axis affect the light received by Earth as it revolves around the sun?

Observations:

1. When the light is pointing straight towards the sun, close to the equator, the squares on the graph are squared and stretched out, while on the poles the shape is irregular.

Summer Observations:

· In the summer, I noticed the grids are more irregular shape at the equator than at the poles.

· I also noticed that the grid was more spread out at the south pole and at the north pole, the squares are more regular.

Winter Observations:

· In the winter, I noticed that the grids are more “square” in the South Pole and at the equator they were sort of the same but not quite.

· At the North Pole you can see that the squared are more irregular shaped.

The 7 questions:

1. When it is winter in the Northern Hemisphere is when the top of the axis is facing away from the sun. The area that gets the most concentrated light/sun/heat is at the equator. When its summer in the Northern Hemisphere, the most sunlight is concentrated more in between the North Pole and the equator. Likewise for when it is summer in the Southern hemisphere.

2. I observed during the summer at the North Pole the squares were more regular, but in the winter I noticed that the squares were more irregularly shaped. The reason for this is because in the summer the Northern Hemisphere is pointing more towards the sun than in the winter, therefore the sun is more concentrated/direct on the northern hemisphere.

3. It was cool, because where the light/heat was distributed evenly the squares were spread out more, and in the more concentrated places, the squares are more, square J.

4. The coldest areas are the poles because the light doesn’t reach all the way over to them so they have a much lower temperature.

5. The toothpick will have the longest shadow when it is summer, it will have its shortest shadow when it is winter.

6. The heat received at the equator is greater that the heat being received at the poles because the sunlight/heat is direct at the equator but at the poles the sunlight/heat is hitting at a greater angel than at the equator. Therefore, the sunlight is more spread out at the poles than at the equator.

7. The seasons are caused by the tilt of the Earth's rotational axis away or toward the sun as it travels through its yearlong path around the sun. The Earth has a tilt of 22.5 degrees. The tilt toward the sun is maximized during Northern Hemisphere summer in late June (the "summer solstice"). At this time, the amount of sunlight reaching the Northern Hemisphere is at a maximum. The tilt away from the sun is maximized during Northern Hemisphere winter (the "winter solstice"). At this time, the amount of sunlight reaching the Northern Hemisphere is at a minimum.