Earths Moon

by Kit t W ins ton illustra ted by Bill Melvin dtpm23 Stamp Large white by Kitt Winston illustrated by Bill Melvin Copyright © by Harcourt, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work should be addressed to School Permissions and Copyrights, Harcourt, Inc., 6277 Sea Harbor Drive, Orlando, Florida 32887-6777. Fax: 407-345-2418. HARCOURT and the Harcourt Logo are trademarks of Harcourt, Inc., registered in the United States of America and/or other jurisdictions. Printed in the United States of America ISBN 10: 0-15-350506-0 ISBN 13: 978-0-15-350506-5 Ordering Options ISBN 10: 0-15-350333-5 (Grade 3 Below-Level Collection) ISBN 13: 978-0-15-350333-7 (Grade 3 Below-Level Collection) ISBN 10: 0-15-357494-1 (package of 5) ISBN 13: 978-0-15-357494-8 (package of 5) If you have received these materials as examination copies free of charge, Harcourt School Publishers retains title to the materials and they may not be resold. Resale of examination copies is strictly prohibited and is illegal. Possession of this publication in print format does not entitle users to convert this publication, or any portion of it, into electronic format. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 179 12 11 10 09 08 07 06 dtpm23 Medium On a clear night, the moon shines brightly overhead. You might think that the moon gives off light, but it does not. Light from the sun refl ects off the moon’s surface. Sometimes the moon looks like a large ball steady in the sky. Other times it looks like a tiny sliver. Myths, or legends, were made up by early people to explain why the moon changes shape. 3 dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium The early people of Greenland thought the sun goddess was chasing her brother, the moon god, across the sky. Greenland is an island in North America. The moon god ran so much that he forgot to eat, so as days passed, he became thinner. Finally, the moon god had to stop and eat. He got bigger, and the chase began all over again. 4 dtpm23 Medium Today people understand why the shape of the moon changes. The changes in the shape of the moon are caused by the way the moon moves in space. The moon moves in two ways. It rotates, or spins around like a top. It takes the moon about twenty-nine days to rotate once. It also travels in a path around the earth called an orbit. 5 dtpm23 Medium The different shapes of the moon are called phases. This is what the phases of the moon look like: full waxing gibbous half moon waning waxing 6 dtpm23 Medium dtpm4 New Stamp dtpm4 New Stamp dtpm4 New Stamp dtpm4 New Stamp dtpm4 New Stamp The phases of the moon in order are: full, waning gibbous, half moon, crescent, new moon, waxing crescent, half moon, waxing gibbous, and full. g gibbous g crescent half moon new crescent 7 dtpm23 Medium dtpm4 New Stamp dtpm4 New Stamp dtpm4 New Stamp The moon takes about twenty-nine days to orbit around the earth. The sun always lights up half of the moon. We do not always see the lit-up half from the earth. When you see all the lit-up half of the moon, the moon appears to be a full circle. This is called the full moon. 8 dtpm23 Medium As the moon travels around the earth, we see less and less of the lit part. This is called the waning moon. Soon the lit-up part of the moon disappears from sight. This is called the new moon. 9 dtpm23 Medium Then the moon starts to look lit up again, and the lit part that you see gets bigger each day. This is called the waxing moon. It takes about twenty-nine days for all the phases. That’s the same amount of time it takes for the moon to make one trip around the earth. 10 dtpm23 Medium Starting in the 1950s, spacecraft were sent to study the moon. The spacecraft orbited the moon. In this way, scientists learned more and more about the moon. 11 dtpm23 Medium Then, on July 20, 1969, the fi rst spacecraft carrying astronauts from the earth actually landed on the moon! People were able to watch as a person walked on the moon’s surface for the fi rst time ever. It was on television! 12 dtpm23 Medium The astronauts sent the pictures of the moon back to the earth. The astronauts brought moon rocks back to the earth. From the rocks, scientists have learned a lot about the moon. The rocks were evidence that scientists could study to fi nd out how the moon might have been formed. 13 dtpm23 Medium Scientists think the moon might once have been part of the earth. They think a large object from space hit the earth millions of years ago. The dust and ashes from the earth went into space and formed the moon. People have learned a lot about the moon since early times! 14 dtpm23 Medium Word Count: 555 Think Critically 1. Why does the moon’s shape appear to change in the sky? 2. How does the moon’s shape change after the full moon? 3. Why do you think early people made up stories about the moon? 4. What question would you ask the first astronauts who landed on the moon? 5. What did you learn about the moon that surprised you? Explain. Science On the Moon Use a book or the Internet to fi nd out more about when humans landed on the moon. Write a paragraph that tells what you learned. School-Home Connection With a family member, look at the moon every night for one month. Draw a picture each night to show what it looks like. Then look at all the pictures to see how it changed. dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium dtpm23 Medium Ë|xHSKBPDy505065zv*:+:!:+:! > ISBN-13: 978-0-15-350506-5 ISBN-10: 0-15-350506-0 GRADE 3 Lesson 29 WORD COUNT 555 GENRE Expository Nonfi ction LEVEL Below Level Harcourt Leveled Readers Online Database << /ASCII85EncodePages false /AllowTransparency false /AutoPositionEPSFiles true /AutoRotatePages /PageByPage /Binding /Left /CalGrayProfile () /CalRGBProfile (sRGB IEC61966-2.1) /CalCMYKProfile (U.S. Web Coated \050SWOP\051 v2) /sRGBProfile (sRGB IEC61966-2.1) /CannotEmbedFontPolicy /Warning /CompatibilityLevel 1.2 /CompressObjects /Off /CompressPages true /ConvertImagesToIndexed true /PassThroughJPEGImages true /CreateJDFFile false /CreateJobTicket true /DefaultRenderingIntent /Default /DetectBlends true /DetectCurves 0.1000 /ColorConversionStrategy /LeaveColorUnchanged /DoThumbnails true /EmbedAllFonts true /EmbedOpenType false /ParseICCProfilesInComments true /EmbedJobOptions true /DSCReportingLevel 0 /EmitDSCWarnings false /EndPage -1 /ImageMemory 524288 /LockDistillerParams false /MaxSubsetPct 100 /Optimize true /OPM 1 /ParseDSCComments true /ParseDSCCommentsForDocInfo true /PreserveCopyPage true /PreserveDICMYKValues true /PreserveEPSInfo true /PreserveFlatness true /PreserveHalftoneInfo true /PreserveOPIComments false /PreserveOverprintSettings true /StartPage 1 /SubsetFonts false /TransferFunctionInfo /Preserve /UCRandBGInfo /Remove /UsePrologue true /ColorSettingsFile (None) /AlwaysEmbed [ true ] /NeverEmbed [ true /Courier /Courier-Bold /Courier-BoldOblique /Courier-Oblique /Helvetica /Helvetica-Bold /Helvetica-BoldOblique /Helvetica-Oblique /Symbol /Times-Bold /Times-BoldItalic /Times-Italic /Times-Roman /ZapfDingbats ] /AntiAliasColorImages false /CropColorImages true /ColorImageMinResolution 150 /ColorImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK /DownsampleColorImages true /ColorImageDownsampleType /Average /ColorImageResolution 300 /ColorImageDepth -1 /ColorImageMinDownsampleDepth 1 /ColorImageDownsampleThreshold 1.50000 /EncodeColorImages true /ColorImageFilter /DCTEncode /AutoFilterColorImages true /ColorImageAutoFilterStrategy /JPEG /ColorACSImageDict << /QFactor 0.76 /HSamples [2 1 1 2] /VSamples [2 1 1 2] >> /ColorImageDict << /QFactor 0.15 /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1] >> /JPEG2000ColorACSImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /JPEG2000ColorImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /AntiAliasGrayImages false /CropGrayImages true /GrayImageMinResolution 150 /GrayImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK /DownsampleGrayImages true /GrayImageDownsampleType /Average /GrayImageResolution 300 /GrayImageDepth -1 /GrayImageMinDownsampleDepth 2 /GrayImageDownsampleThreshold 1.50000 /EncodeGrayImages true /GrayImageFilter /DCTEncode /AutoFilterGrayImages true /GrayImageAutoFilterStrategy /JPEG /GrayACSImageDict << /QFactor 0.76 /HSamples [2 1 1 2] /VSamples [2 1 1 2] >> /GrayImageDict << /QFactor 0.15 /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1] >> /JPEG2000GrayACSImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /JPEG2000GrayImageDict << /TileWidth 256 /TileHeight 256 /Quality 30 >> /AntiAliasMonoImages false /CropMonoImages true /MonoImageMinResolution 1200 /MonoImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK /DownsampleMonoImages true /MonoImageDownsampleType /Average /MonoImageResolution 1200 /MonoImageDepth -1 /MonoImageDownsampleThreshold 1.50000 /EncodeMonoImages true /MonoImageFilter /CCITTFaxEncode /MonoImageDict << /K -1 >> /AllowPSXObjects true /CheckCompliance [ /None ] /PDFX1aCheck false /PDFX3Check false /PDFXCompliantPDFOnly false /PDFXNoTrimBoxError true /PDFXTrimBoxToMediaBoxOffset [ 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 ] /PDFXSetBleedBoxToMediaBox true /PDFXBleedBoxToTrimBoxOffset [ 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 ] /PDFXOutputIntentProfile (None) /PDFXOutputConditionIdentifier () /PDFXOutputCondition () /PDFXRegistryName () /PDFXTrapped /False >> setdistillerparams << /HWResolution [2400 2400] /PageSize [612.000 792.000] >> setpagedevice