Unit II: The Moon
CELESTIAL TOWER · UNIT II OF VI
Ah, the Moon. Every culture that ever looked up fell a little in love with her, and no wonder: she is the one light in the sky that keeps a schedule we can follow. In this unit we study Earth's companion the way this whole course studies everything, lore first and mechanism always. Your Moon Journal, begun in Lesson 1, comes into its full own here: one complete lunation of watching and sketching, at whatever pace the clouds and your calendar allow. She is patient. You can be too.
Unit Learning Objectives
By the end of this unit, scholars will be able to:
- Explain moon phases as the changing portion of the moon's sunlit half visible from Earth, distinguishing phases from eclipses.
- Keep a Moon Journal through one complete lunation, observing and sketching at their own pace.
- Evaluate moon-name lore with honest sourcing, identifying which "traditional" names are genuinely old and which are modern popularizations.
- Explain how solar and lunar eclipses happen and practice certified-safe viewing methods.
- Explain tides as the moon's gravitational pull on Earth's oceans, and read the moon's face: maria, craters, and the Apollo landing sites.
In This Unit
Lesson 7: The Phases of the Moon
The moon's changing face is sunlit geometry, not Earth's shadow; the Moon Journal begins in earnest.
Wolf Moon, Harvest Moon, Blue Moon: which names are truly old, which are modern inventions, and how to tell the difference.
The cosmic coincidence behind solar and lunar eclipses, the history of humans fearing them and learning to predict them, and the safety drill for watching them properly.
Lesson 10: Tides & the Moon's Pull
How the moon stretches Earth's oceans into spring and neap tides, with tidal lore kept honestly separate from tidal mechanism.
The giant-impact story of the moon's birth, reading the maria and craters, and the Apollo landings: humans standing on the thing we had only ever watched.
The Unit II Quiz closes this unit. You will find it, with its download, at the end of Lesson 11: The Moon Up Close.
What Scholars Will Observe, Practice, and Make
Scholars sketch the moon nightly through a full lunation, research one culture's moon-name traditions and present the sourcing honestly, build a pinhole projector for indirect solar viewing, check a tide table against the moon's phase for a week, and map the near side's major features from their own journal sketches.
The Moon keeps perfect time, but five bright lights in the sky never could. In Unit III we chase the Wanderers: the planets that refused to stay put, and the centuries it took humanity to understand them.
From the Celestial Shelf
The printed companions to this unit, from Professor Glimmerwick’s shelf in the shop.
