Moon phases

KevinK

I am a student teacher and am hoping to introduce my class to the phases of the moon but I have encountered a problem.


I designed a chart and have written "first quarter or half moon" and "last quarter or half moon" to describe two of the phases. However I am worried that this might be confusing. Do you think I should pick one and stick with it?


Doing a little bit of research first quarter and last quarter would seem the more prevalent names on the internet if a little counterintuitive.


A friend who generally know more about these things, just laughed and said the quarter moons were ridiculous and that everybody says half moons. Any opinions on which I should go with? It's for second class.


I'm leaning towards leaving both in and explaining why both are correct.

coylemj

Calendars, diaries and almanacs all stick to the classic names: 'First Quarter', 'Full Moon' and 'Last Quarter'. There's enough dumbing down going on these days, what's so special about this generation of students?

Your friend who 'generally knows about these things' is talking nonsense. The people who talk about half moons probably don't understand the phases of the moon at all. If you mix quarters and half moons in the description you will confuse the hell out of them.

jfSDAS

Hi Kevin,

I agree with coylemj on the names of the lunar phases. People generally refer to them as First Quarter or Last Quarter and almanacs, etc with use the same terms.

A couple of good web sites for teaching materials are:

Universe Awareness ... http://www.unawe.org/

The Astronomical Society of the Pacific ... https://www.astrosociety.org/education/ (links on the right-hand side of this page)

Paper Plate Astronomy ... http://analyzer.depaul.edu/paperplate/activities.htm (there are some terrific projects for the classroom on this page)

Great astronomy cartoons ... http://www.jackstargazer.com/Cartoons.html (another cartoonist, Jay Ryan, featured in Sky & Telescope magazine during the mid-2000s. His archive was online but seems to have disappeared).

John

namloc1980

Stick with the quarters as calling it half moons is just not right. The moons cycle is c. 29.5 days with the first quarter phase happening after just over 7 seven days after new moon. Using first quarter / last quarter is much more logical and less confusing than half moon.