Hello and welcome to today's lesson from the Unit Earth, Sun, and Moon.

This lesson is called Observing the Moon.

In this lesson today, you are going to think about the best ways for you to make observations of the moon, and we're also going to think about different ways to record your observations over time.

Let's start by looking at today's keywords: moon, crater, telescope, astronomer, observe.

Now, there might be some words here that you haven't used before, so take a moment to think about which of these words do you already know and which of these words will you be particularly looking out for in the lesson today? Today's lesson is in two parts.

In the first part, we'll be thinking about how to observe the moon, and you'll be beginning to make your own observations of the moon.

And in the second part, we'll be moving on to recording observations of the moon over a period of about 28 days.

So that's an extended period of time.

Let's focus our attention onto the moon.

We know that most evenings when it's not cloudy, you can see the moon in the night sky.

So if you've had an opportunity to look up at the moon, how would you describe the surface of the moon? What words would you use to describe the moon? Now, the moon's surface might look smooth to you, but actually it's rocky and rough.

Over many years, the moon has been hit by space rocks travelling at high speeds.

And when I'm talking about space rocks, often these are referred to as asteroids and meteorites.

Let's take a closer look at the surface of the moon.

Yes, if we look really closely, we can see these circular impact shapes rather like holes.

So where these space rocks have smashed into the moon as they're travelling through space at high speeds, they leave behind these circular holes called craters.

When we observe the moon, you might see craters and you also might see dark spots on the surface of the moon.

And I think this is sometimes why people say there's a man in the moon when you can often see a face and these are just the shaded areas of dark rock.

Scientists in the past thought that these shaded areas, these dark spots were actually oceans.

Today, we know that there are no such large bodies of liquid water on the moon and scientists in the past actually named these Luna Maria which means the seas of the moon, but actually they're not seas at all.

Do you know what these dark spots might actually be? Well, modern scientists have collected evidence from the moon and they can now explain that these dark areas are dried lava that have actually formed into this very dark rock called basalt.

Can you see how dark black it is in colour? And it's actually this that's on the surface of the moon that makes it look like there's these areas of dark spots.

I'm now going to check your understanding from the first part of today's lesson, and I'm looking for which two answers describe the surface of the moon.

Is the surface of the moon smooth and shiny, rough and rocky, with mountains and craters, or with rivers and seas? Which two answers do you think it is? So our two answers are the surface of the moon is rough and rocky, and we also know that there are mountains and craters.

If you think about those impact craters that have been made with rocks travelling at high speeds through space and bashing into the surface of the moon, And we know that it's not D because even though scientists in the past thought that there were seas and oceans on the moon, modern scientists tell us that that's not the case.

Moving on to a true or false question now.

Circle shaped holes on the moon are called dark spots.

Is that true or is that false? It's false.

And now I want you to take a moment to justify your answer.

So circle shaped holes on the moon are not called dark spots.

So can you tell me why do you think that? You might want to write your ideas down or you might want to talk to somebody about what you think.

And I can tell you that circle shaped holes on the moon are not dark spots.

They're actually called craters.

Did you remember that one? Well done.

There are different types of scientists that study different types of things.

Scientists who study the night sky are called astronomers.

They observe objects in space such as stars, planets, and moons.

Would you call yourself an astronomer? Maybe that's a hobby of yours, looking up to the night sky.

I wonder if you own any of these.

So astronomers, they use things like telescopes and binoculars to look more closely at objects in space.

Equipment such as these help them to see much further into space so you get a much more detailed view of things especially when you are observing the surface of the moon.

Galileo was an astronomer from Italy and he made many important discoveries about space.

In 1609, so a long time ago, he observed the moon through a very early telescope and he produced this set of rather incredible drawings.

Take a moment to have a really close look at Galileo's sketches of the moon.

What detail can you notice that he's included in his sketches? Can you see craters? Can you see dark spots or can you see something else? Now, these sketches are really important because it was the first time that anyone had shown the moon's surface to be uneven and Galileo was the first person to show in detail that the surface of the moon had valleys and craters and mountains.

Other scientists in the past had recorded their observations of the moon, but none of them had looked quite like this before.

Today, we are not just relying on sketches of the moon.

We have photos and video evidence about the surface of the moon.

In 1969, Apollo 11 was the first American space flight to actually land humans on the moon.

And we now have the most incredible photographs and images and video recordings that show us exactly what the moon surface is like.

So way back in 1969, we were able to collect this incredible photographic evidence of the surface of the moon.

Can you see that the surface is rough and rocky and dusty? If you look really carefully, you can actually see the footprints of this person walking on the moon.

Do you know who this person was? Yes, it was Commander Neil Armstrong.

So he was the first man to walk on the surface of the moon.

But don't forget, he was followed very closely by the pilot of the mission, Edwin Aldrin, who was always known to his friends as Buzz.

I'm going to check your understanding now.

So another true/false question.

An astrologer is a scientist who observes objects in space.

Do you think that's true or do you think that's false? Now, be careful with this one.

It's false.

Why do you think this one is false? Can you justify your answer? I think this because yes, we know that it's not actually an astrologer, it's an astronomer, and that's a scientist who observes objects in space.

Another question for you now, which of these would you not use to observe the moon from Earth? Would you not use a hand lens? Would you not use a telescope or would you not use binoculars? Yes, that's right.

It's a hand lens.

We would definitely use a telescope and binoculars to help us to see things that are really far away such as when we are standing on the surface of the Earth and we're looking up ever so far away to the moon.

We're moving on to our first practise task from today's lesson, and I would really love it for you to make your own observations of the moon.

So what you would need to do is wait for a clear evening.

It's not always possible to see the moon because quite often in the night sky, there's too many clouds.

So keep looking out for a nice clear evening.

And you need to select a safe place to view the moon.

So make sure that you are with an adult and you are in a nice safe place.

Obviously, we want it to be a dark place away from any bright lights.

So please don't venture out anywhere by yourself late at night.

Alternatively, if you can't get outside with an adult, then have a look in various rooms in your house, look out different windows until you can find a window where you can clearly see the moon in the sky.

So once you've selected your viewing location, you quite often need to take some time to let your eyes adjust to the dark and just take a little bit longer to look really closely at the moon, at the surface of the moon, and you are particularly looking at light and dark areas.

You might be able to see some craters maybe.

You definitely might be able to see some dark spots and maybe even some mountains on the moon.

Now, once you've made your observations, you're going to draw a detailed picture of what you observe.

So you're going to need some paper and a pencil and you're going to be a scientist or an astronomer just like Galileo.

And you're going to create your own detailed drawings of the surface of the moon.

And to accompany your drawing, it would be wonderful if you could also write a couple of sentences to describe what you see, so any features that you observe on the surface of the moon.

Let's have a look at an example of this.

So I've drawn a sketch of the moon.

I went out one evening and I spent some time, actually quite a long time, allowing my eyes to adjust to the dark and gazing up to the night sky.

And here is my sketch.

I'm gonna share with you my description of the moon.

I've shaded the dark spots of the moon and I've left the lighter areas.

I've also drawn circle shaped holes to show craters.

I've smudged the pencil lines to show that the moon is rough, rocky, and dusty.

I wonder how you've managed to show those things on your sketch of the moon and have you also been able to describe what you see.

You could actually download a moon map from the internet and a moon map is something that will help you to identify these things that you've observed.

Whilst you are observing the moon, you might have some questions that you want to find answers to.

So keep track of any questions that you think of whilst you are outside observing the moon.

Talk about these with somebody else.

And it would be brilliant if you could carry out your own research.

You could go to a library.

You could look through some books or you could carry out your own research online.

See if you can find answers to the questions that's sparking your own curiosity.

We're moving on now to the second part of today's lessons.

We've made our observations of the moon.

We have drawn a sketch of the surface of the moon, but now we are going on to think about how to record our observations over an extended period of time.

Have you ever looked at the moon on different nights of the month? And did you notice did the moon look exactly the same each night or on different nights across the month? Does it appear to change at all? The moon is always a sphere.

Now, this is a little bit confusing, isn't it? Because it looks like its shape is changing.

It's always a sphere, its shape just appears to change on different nights throughout the month.

Sometimes the moon looks like the shape of a banana and we call this shape a crescent moon.

Which other shapes can the moon appear to be? Scientists who study the moon, astronomers, use different methods to record their observations of the moon over time.

So if I was observing the moon every night for one month, it'd be a brilliant idea to actually record what the moon looks like so that we have further evidence of how the moon appears to change shape.

Astronomers might record their observations of the moon each night for one month too.

Do you fancy having a go at that? Let's think about how astronomers might record their observations.

They could draw the moon each night.

They could take a photo of the moon each night.

They could write a description of the moon each night.

Or do you have any other ideas? Let's take a moment to check your understanding of how we can record our observations of the moon over time.

Which statement below is not true? The moon is always the shape of a sphere.

The moon is different shapes on different days.

The moon appears to be different shapes on different days.

Which one do you think is not true? Yes, it's B.

The moon is different shapes on different days.

Actually that's not true.

We know that the moon is always the shape of a sphere and it just appears to be different.

How about this one? Which is not a reason why scientists keep a record of their observations? To remember what happened.

To show people what they found out.

To practise their drawing and photography skills, or to help other scientists observe the same thing.

Which of these is not a reason why scientists keep a record? Yes, that's right.

We don't really keep records to practise our drawing and photography skills.

We might do that outside of the investigation, but we're going to keep a record to remember exactly what happened and that we can show other people what we found out and also with the hope that other scientists can also observe the same thing.

Well done.

And now it's time for you to observe the moon in the night sky.

And I'd like you to make these observations over an extended period of time.

It would be brilliant if you could make your observations over at least four weeks.

Use this chart to record your observations over time.

So I've got a chart here.

I'm going to call it a moon diary, and I've already drawn in a dotted circle for you which gives you a rough idea of the outline of the shape of the moon.

And you can see we've got each little box labelled so that you can take a pencil and draw a little sketch of what the moon looks like from day one through to day 28.

Please remember to record your first observation of the moon this evening and then keep recording for at least the next 28 days.

Now, it's really important that you tell an adult that you are going to be going outside maybe to look up at the night sky each evening and please encourage somebody to come outside with you and help you to make your observations.

But it's up to you.

You're the astronomer who's going to be recording what you see over 28 days.

I've got one final last tip for you.

Now, don't forget the same as when we made our observations of the moon when we were particularly looking at the surface of the moon.

You don't have to go outside if you haven't got somebody available to come out with you.

So just remember that you can find a window where you can look out of the window and just double check that you can see the moon and you can sketch it from there.

And also a final thing is remember, you might not see the moon every single evening.

It might be too cloudy.

So on your chart for that evening, you might just want to draw some clouds covering the dotted circle on the chart.

And that just shows that you weren't able to make that observation on that particular evening.

I think that's everything that you need to know now.

Good luck.

Here is an example of some observations of the moon recorded over 28 days using pencil drawings.

So you can see here that I've used the chart.

And from night one across to night 28, I very carefully used my pencil to shade the shape of the moon.

I wonder if your moon diary is going to look anything similar or different to mine.

And now it's time to summarise our learning.

We've almost reached the end of the lesson.

What have we learned today? Well, we know that the moon's surface is rocky and rough and there are dark spots and holes called craters.

Take a look at that photograph of the surface of the moon.

It certainly is not a smooth and shiny surface.

What else can you remember from today? Yes, well done.

So scientists called astronomers, they observe the night sky and they use certain pieces of equipment to help them with that, such as telescopes and binoculars to enable them to see things that are very far away in more detail.

Our final learning from today is that the moon actually appears to change shape over the course of the month.

But we know what shape it always is, don't we? It's always a sphere, but it does appear differently across a period of about 28 days.

So you can make your own observations and you can record your observations in different ways.

And the last thing for you to do now is have a go at the exit quiz.

Remember, you are now an astronomer so think like an astronomer and apply everything that you've learned today.

I will see you next time.