Content Understanding

   Through this moon blog, I learned a lot about the phases of the moon. Also, I didn’t realize that the moon rises and sets at such random times throughout the day. Doing twenty days worth of observations was really great for me, because I got to see the moon in so many different ways. I have never done anything like this before so it was actually fun and interesting.

   When the moon revolves around the earth, it’s as though it’s changing shape. The phases are made by the way the moon and sun align as the moon revolves around earth. This is what makes up the phases. The moon rises and sets at different times because of earth’s spin on it’s axis and the moon revolves around the earth. This causes the moon to be at different angles when we see it.

This is a fun way to tell if the moon is going to get bigger (waxing) or if it will shrink (waning).

1.       Hold your right hand out and put all of your fingers together. Then point your thumb at the ground. At this point, your thumb and finger should be making a backwards “C”.  This is the Waxing moon. If the moon looks like the shape your fingers made, it’s Waxing.

2.       If you do the same thing with your left hand, you know it’s the Waning moon. This means the moon will grow smaller every day.

3.       So if the moon is Waxing (right hand) it will grow bigger. If the moon is Waning (left hand) it will grow smaller.