A "Moonth" of a Phase

"Have you ever noticed that when you write on a white sheet of paper with a white marker you can't really see the marker?" That is because it blends in. This relates to the sun, moon and the way we see the moon according to the sun. 

The way we see the moon depends on the way it orbits around the earth and the way the sun shines its rays toward Earth.

What causes the phases of the moon? What are they, why do they happen?

When the moon is in-between the sun and the Earth we can’t see it because it is dark and it blends in with the sky. When the moon is on the right or left side of the moon, not in between the sun and the Earth, half of the moon is visible because the other half is dark. However when the moon is on the opposite side of the sun, we can see the entire moon because it is light. The moon orbits around bit higher than the Earth which is why it received light, however when it is between the sun and Earth, you could only see the moon from the sun because that is where the sunlight is being received.  

This is when the moon is in between the sun and the Earth. As you can see on the right side of the moon, where the sun is, the light is being receiver, but on the right side, closer to the Earth, it is dark so it blends in with the sky not allowing people standing to see the moon.

Here on the other hand one side of the Earth is illuminated meaning they have day, while on the other side there is night. On the side with night, the sun is shining on the moon because it is orbiting higher than the Earth. In this picture, if a person was standing on the dark side of the Earth, they would see a full moon. 

Here is a diagram showing how the moon looks at different stages:

1. In your model what represents Earth? The Sun? The Moon?

 To represent the sun my partner and I used a flashlight which was pointed at the Earth. The Earth was a big styrofoam ball where we had the equator marked, and our moon was the smallest, it was a small styrofoam ball.

2. Refer back to your 4 circles. How much of the lighted part of the moon did you see when facing the lamp?

If a human would be facing the lamp, and the moon is in between them and the sun, they will not see the moon because it will blend in with the sky. In the drawing above, you can see that the sun in shining on the right side of the moon, so it makes the other half dark, causing us to not see anything. However if you were standing on the sun, the moon would be very visible because all of the sunlight would be shining toward it. Knowing this, we can say when the moon is in between the Earth and the sun, 1/2 of the moon is enlightened while the other is dark.

3. Which drawing represents a full moon? A new moon? Which represents a waxing crescent? A waning crescent?

 Drawing number 3 represents a full moon. A full moon is when the "entire sunlit side faces the Earth", and in this case, because the moon is a bit higher than the Earth, the sunlight gets to it and it is dark on the opposite side which doesn't matter because the Earth is not there. A new moon is basically when the "sunlit side faces away from the Earth", drawing 1 would represent this because the moon is not visible. It is not visible because the suns rays are not reaching the side facing Earth, instead they are lightning the face facing the sun. Waxing crescent would be diagram number 2 because as you can see, the lines are showing the moon is going from right to left, and a waxing crescent is when you can see the moon waxing/growing into a crescent shape, in this case a full moon. And lastly, the waning crescent would be number 4 because you can still see a crescent, however it is starting to shrink and gets smaller as it moves into the light.

4.How much of the lighted part of the ball did you see after each turn?

 At each point you would see a different phase of the moon if you were on Earth, when it was between the Earth and the sun you couldn't see anything, however when it came around it would become more clear and then again dissapear.  The moon moves constantly, meaning if you were looking at the moon you would only see the lightened part and the rest would be a shadow. However if you were to look from above, you would see the lightened and dark side. 

5. Whether you could see it or not, how much of the balls surface was always lit by the lamp? Was the darkness of the new moon caused by an eclipse?
 Because the moon always rotates the same way, half of the moon is always lit up, because a new moon, the half facing the sun was lit up but we can't see it, it just depends on where the moon is and where from Earth we are looking at it. No, the darkness of the new moon is not caused by an eclipse, it depends on how they are lined up, an eclipse happens when the moon sun and earth are lined up ll together causing an eclipse.

 6. How well did making a model help you understand the phases of the moon? What are some advantages of using models? (What is another way to make a model to represent the various phases of the moon?)

Drawing a model and using it helped me because I could see how the light was shining exactly and observe from every side of the model not only from a picture of it. The advantages of making a model are that you can change it if you want to look at something different, you can observe from different places, you can see for yourself and you can make your own observations, and if you don't understand something the teacher or anyone could show you on the model. One can make a model out of different material or only draw a picture showing the various phases, however I think a model is very helpful and makes things easier.