We are currently studying the Solar System and Seasons.

Use the links below to help you better understand this unit.

We experience seasons and different weather for 2 reasons:

1) The earth is tilted at 23.5 degrees and so we are sometimes tilted towards the sun and sometimes tilted away from the sun.

2) The Earth revolves around the sun, while also rotating on Earth's own axis.

We see 8 different moon phases during a month.  We see them because the moon is rotating while it is revolving around us.  The part of the moon that we see is because that is the part that the sun is reaching and creating light on.

We experience a solar eclipse when the moon blocks the light from the sun.  Above you can see what is happening in the solar system.  On earth we see the image below...where the moon is blocking the sun.

The oceans also experience High Tide and Low Tide because of the moon's gravitational pull.  Below you can see we experience high tide when the moon and the sun are pulling on the earth's water.  We experience low tide when we have rotated away from the moon and sun and do not feel as large a gravitational pull.  

Check out the song we sang in class (make sure the click 'play' and not iTunes): 

~ Download lyrics here (pdf) ~

Sun, Earth, and Moon Song

 Team Straus Science Units

Click here for the government standards in Science (GLCEs)