1. The Phases of the Moon pages

2. Bellringer – we’ll have a Super-moon on November 14th
A super moon is when the moon appears larger than normal as a full moon.
Questions:
Is the size of the moon actually changing?
What does this tell you about its’ orbit?
Regular vs. Super moon

3. Super moon
A supermoon is a full moon or a new moon with the CLOSEST approach the Moon makes to the Earth on its elliptical orbit, resulting in the largest apparent size of the lunar disk as seen from Earth.

4. Why do we see the moon with different amounts of it’s surface lit during a month?

5. It has been since ______that the Apollo Mission and Neil Armstrong walked on the Moon.
The Moon is still the ONLY other celestial body (besides Earth) that humans have walked on.

6. “Luna” our Moon Moon is our nearest neighbor
2nd brightest object in the sky (What’s the brightest?)
For a planet to have one large moon is unusual.
Galileo first observed the Moon with a telescope in 1609.
What he saw conflicted with the existing theories (made of cheese?!)
He noticed that it had a rough surface, craters, mountains, valleys, and what at the time seemed to be seas (maria).
He concluded that the Moon was not all that different from Earth.
This took away the mystery of the Moon

7. Cold, Hard Facts pg. 557
The Moon’s diameter of 2,160 miles at its equator.
1/4th size of Earth
1/6th Earth’s mass
Density 3.3 g/cc (Earth’s is about 5.0 g/cc)
If Earth were the size of your head, the orbiting Moon would be the size of a tennis ball 30 feet away.

8. Cold, Hard Facts The surface gravity on the Moon is 1/6 that on Earth.
This is why astronauts can jump as they do.
If you weigh 160 lbs. on Earth, you would weigh _________lbs on the Moon.

9. A Cold, Hard Place
The Moon is not massive enough to hold on to an atmosphere, so there is no atmosphere.
Moon craters are the result of asteroid and meteoroid impacts millions of years ago.

10. Is There Life?
The Moon is apparently as “dead” geologically as it is biologically.
There is no internal heat, magma, plate tectonics (so it cannot make light – it only reflects sunlight – like the Earth!).

11. Tides
The moon's gravitational pull on the Earth is the main cause of the rise and fall of ocean tides.
The moon's gravitational pull causes two bulges of water on the Earth's oceans
where ocean waters face the moon and the pull is strongest and one where ocean waters face away from the moon and the pull is weakest.

12. POM Chart (in your note book)
PHENOMENON:
What do you OBSERVE?
What evidence do you have?
OBJECTS:
Define the system.
What objects are interacting?
MODEL:
Describe the motion in a model that explains your observations
Together as a class, look at the previous slide of the moon phases and write observations in the P part of the chart.

13. Rules of the Moon game The Sun starts and STAYS on the left
Use your phone flashlight for sunlight
The bright half of the Earth and moon always face the sun
The Earth and Sun will NOT move!
Move the Moon keeping the light side facing with the Sun
Make a telescope out of paper to view the moon from Earth (Always view from EARTH!)

15. What Phase of the Moon?
Waning Waning Gibbous Crescent

16. Phases of the Moon: the daily changes in the moon’s appearance as viewed from Earth
Position 1 Day 1
All but invisible in the sky.
Moon and sun are lined-up in the same direction as seen from Earth.
The Sun is behind the moon.

17. Phases of the Moon Day 4 Waxing crescent moon (‘wax on’)
Position 2
Day 4
Waxing crescent
moon
(‘wax on’)
The moon appears
to grow brighter
each night
The moon gets brighter going to the LEFT

18. Phases of the Moon 7 days old, the Moon is at its first quarter.
This is the optimum night to look at the Moon.
Lunar features are in their most deeply shadowed relief.
Position 3

19. Phases of the moon 10 days old
Position 4
10 days old
As the Moon enters is waxing gibbous phase beyond first quarter,
It is nearly full, and it becomes very bright.

20. Phases of the moon Full moon 14 days old
Position 5
Full moon
14 days old
Sun and moon are at opposite sides of the Earth.
The moon is brightest and “shines” by reflected sunlight

21. Phases of the Moon 18 days old Waning (away) Slowly getting darker.
Position 6
18 days old
Waning (away)
Slowly getting darker.
Waning gibbous

22. Phases of the moon 3rd quarter moon 22 days old It continues to wane
Position 7
22 days old
3rd quarter moon
It continues to wane
The Apennine Mountains are clearly visible.
These were the mountains that Galileo studied the most intensely.

23. Phases of the moon
26 days old
Waning crescent
moon
Position 8

24. Phases of the moon
Day 28
New moon again
All but invisible

25. Phases of the Moon modeling activity7 8 6 1 5 2 4 3

26. Quiz! Name that phase!
Waxing or Waning?
Phase…..
Crescent

27. Name that phase!
Waxing or Waning?
Phase…..
Gibbous

28. Name that phase!
Waxing or Waning?
Phase…..
1st Quarter

29. Name that phase!

30. How did we get our Moon?
We still don’t know with certainty how the Moon was formed.
There are four theories of how the Moon was formed.

31. Theory 1
1. The oldest theory: the Moon was originally part of Earth, due to Earth’s fast rotation it and was spun off.
Theory was rejected because the Earth could not have spun quickly enough.

32. 3. The third theory is that the Moon formed independently and it was
2. Another theory holds that the Moon formed separately from Earth around the same time (4.6 bya) and out of the same stuff.
This was rejected after lunar rock samples revealed different “stuff” than Earth.
3. The third theory is that the Moon formed independently and it was
pulled in by Earth’s gravity when it passed too close.

33. 4. The final, and favored, theory is known as the impact theory.
States that a very large object (roughly the size of Mars) collided with Earth 4.5 bya ago when it was still forming.
The debris from the Earth and the colliding object combined into an object with a stable orbit.

34. What if there was no moon?
Suggest 2 ramifications with explanations.
Discovery Video: “If We Had No Moon”
(first 30 min.)
BBC Video: Do We Really Need the Moon?

36. Suggested reading…