The Earth, Sun and Moon

Outcomes

Know the planets orbit the sun.
Know that the planets, moon and sun spin on their own axis.
Describe the movement of Earth and the moon around the sun.
Draw arrows on a diagram to show the relative movement of the planets around the sun.
Draw arrows on a diagram to show the relative movement of the moon around the earth.
Explain how Earth spins on its axis and that this causes night and day.

Earth's Motion

The Sun is the nearest star to Earth and has a diameter 100 times greater than Earth's. The Sun's core reaches temperatures over 15, 000, 000 degrees Celsius, with the surface reaching temps of 5,500 degrees Celsius. A small part of this energy reaches Earth as light and thermal energy.
Earth orbits, or follows a path, around the Sun making one complete revolution every 365.25 days due to the Sun's gravitational pull.
As Earth revolves around the Sun, it rotates, or spins on it's rotational axis, or an imaginary line on which the Earth rotates.
Because Earth's surface is curved, different parts of the Earth's surface receive different amounts of the Sun's energy.
Earth's orbit is an ellipse, or an elongated, closed curve. Because the Sun is not centered in the ellipse, the distance between the Sun and the Earth change during the year.

The orbits of the planets are coplanar because during the Solar System's formation, the planets formed out of a disk of dust which surrounded the Sun. Because that disk of dust was a disk, all in a plane, all of the planets formed in a plane as well.

It takes Earth 24 hours, or 1 day, to make a complete rotation on its axis.
It takes Earth 365 days, or 1 year, to make a complete revolution around the sun

The Moon- Earth's Satellite

The moon seems to shine because it reflects the sunlight.

The gravitational pull of Earth on the Moon causes the Moon to move in an orbit around the Earth. The changing relative positions of the Moon, Earth and Sun cause the phases of the Moon, eclipse, and tides.

Phases- the different forms the Moon takes in its appearance from the Earth; sequence of phases is the lunar cycle lasting 29.5 days.

New moon- when the moon is between Earth and Sun cant be seen.

Waxing Phases- more of the moon's near side is lit each night.

Waxing crescent- first visible thin slice of moon.
fist quarter- half the lighted side of the moon is visible.
waxing gibbous- more than one quarter is visible.
full moon- all the moons lighted side is visible.

Waning phases- less of the illuminated half of Moon is visible after a full moon.

Waning gibbous- starts after full moon when more than half of lit side of moon is still visible.
third quarter- only half the moon's lighted side is visible.
waning crescent- last visible slice before a new moon.

Features on the moon's surface include: