Different Phases Of The Moon Explanation

There are 8 different phases of the moon. They are called, New Moon, Waxing Crescent, 1st Quarter, Waxing Gibbous, Last Quarter and Waining Crescent. The moon changes every night. It takes 291/2 days to get around the earth.



The first phase of the moon is New Moon. It is hard to see the new moon because it is on the opposite side of the earth to the sun, this is because the earth is blocking the sun's light. That also causes High and Low tide because the moon and the earth are pulling the tides. That is called gravitational pull.








The second phase of the moon is Waxing Crescent. This is when the moon looks like it is getting bigger but it is only getting shadowed by the sun's light. It is also pulling the tides because the sun, earth and moon are almost all lined up in a straight line.







The third phase of the moon is First Quarter. It is half black and half white. The white half is the one that can be seen and it gets it's light from the sun. This is when the sun and the earth are in front of the moon, so that is why only half of it can be seen.





The next phase of the moon is Waxing Gibbous. That is when it is almost a full moon so it is close to half way around the earth. The moon is almost at the top of the earth, so if the black part of the moon was lined up with some land and the bulge around the earth was big then that would be high tide.


The fifth phase of the moon is Full Moon. The Full Moon is all white because the sun can get to all of it and the earth is not blocking it. This is when the sun moon and earth are all lined up.


The next phase of the moon is Waining Gibbous. People can only see three quarters of this phase of the moon because the moon is moving around the earth and the sun is shinning on it.


Next is Last Quarter. The Last Quarter is when only half of the moon is visible. It is also known as the Half Moon. At this point the moon has almost made a whole circle around the earth.


The last phase of the moon is Waining Crescent. This is when the moon has finished it's cycle around the earth. It is almost a New Moon again so it is almost all blocked by the earth and the sun is not shinning on even half of it. The tide is not as high when it is a Waining Crescent then when it is a New or Full moon because they are lined up with the bulge and the Waining Crescent is not.


The moon and the sun are very important because the sun gives us light and the moon gives us High and Low tide. The tides give us jobs like being fisherman and if there were no tides there would be no homes for the sea creatures and no sea food for us.