Each time you look at the moon it's going to look a little different.
Sometimes you'll see the entire moon, other times you'll see just a portion of it.
In this video I'd like to go over why the moon looks the way it does
and a few other things about the moon's orbit.
The Moon takes about a month to orbit the Earth.
The Sun can only shine on half the moon at any given time.
Since the moon orbits at exactly the same rate as a spins
we only see one side of the Moon from the Earth.
The side we don't see is usually called the far side of the Moon.
You can also call it the Dark Side of the Moon
but it's not always dark so this name can be a bit confusing.
I'm gonna show a split screen here to show things from two different views.
On the left hand side of the screen I'll show a top down view.
On the right hand side of the screen I'll show what it looks like from Earth.
When the moon is closest to the Sun, the side of the Moon facing the Earth is dark.
The sunlight reflects off the Earth so we can still see the moon if we look closely.
We refer to this as a new moon.
As the Moon comes around we start to see a tiny sliver of the Moon.
This is called the waxing crescent.
A few more days pass by and now we can see half the Moon.
We can call this a half moon but more specifically it's called a first-quarter
because we are a quarter of the way through the phases.
A few more days and only a small portion of the Moon is not lit up.
This is called the waxing gibbous.
When the Moon is on the other side of the Earth it is completely lit.
This is called a full Moon and it's probably the phase that you're most familiar with.
Now the light began to fade. We mirror the previous phases.
Here's the waning gibbous.
The third quarter.
The waning crescent.
...and back to a new moon.
Here's some tricks to remembering the phases.
Waxing means the sunlit portion is increasing.
Waning means the sunlit portion is decreasing.
Crescent is where the moon is mostly dark.
...and gibbous is where the Moon is mostly lit.
Let's make sure we're accurate.
The Earth is rotating once a day tilted by twenty three and a half degrees.
I'm going to bring back my good friend bob here who lives in North America.
Bob can't always see the Moon.
Sometimes he'll be on the opposite side of the Earth.
Because of the Moon's orbit
it will rise about 50 minutes later each day.
Here's the neat thing:
If you know what phase of the Moon we're on
then you know about the right time of day or night to look for the Moon.
If we're currently on a full Moon
then at about the same time the Sun is setting,
we'll be able to see the moon rise.
If we're on a New Moon
it will rise at about the same time that the sun rises.
Now let's take a look at a first quarter Moon.
It will rise at about noon and set at about midnight.
And a third quarter moon will rise at midnight and set about noon.
So there you have it!
I hope that next time you look up at the moon
you see it just a little different than you did before.
If you'd like to learn even more about the Moon
go ahead and click on this video.
...and if you'd like to see how a clicky pen works
go ahead and click on this video.
Thank you for watching
My name is Jared Owen and I will see you in the next video.