Moon Activities for Middle School
- The moon is viewable due to its close proximity to Earth.moon image by vashistha pathak from Fotolia.com
In our solar system, the moon is the closest object situated to our planet Earth, according to the University of Knoxville's Department of Physics. With this in mind, it makes sense that we're able to see the moon with the naked eye. Moon-related activities are a helpful way to further explore this with students. - This simple activity is useful for a quiet time during class or as a take-home assignment. For each student, you'll need to photocopy photos of the different phases of the moon on one piece of paper. On another piece of paper, draw a grid where you mark the 2nd Day Waxing crescent, 4th Day Waxing crescent, 7th Day Waxing Quarter, 10th Day Waxing Gibbous, 14th Day Full Moon, 18th Day Waning Gibbous, 21st Day Waning Crescent, 25th Day Waning Crescent, 27th Day Waning Crescent and the New Moon. Have your students cut out the various images of the phases of the moon then glue them in their appropriate boxes on your grid. If you'd prefer, Science-Class.net has a template that you can print out instead of drawing your own.
- With this activity from Southeast Missouri State University, your students will take an in-depth look at those who have traveled to the moon. You'll need to divide your students into groups then have each group select one of the Apollo missions they'd like to learn more about. You'll also need to arrange some time at the school library so students may work on the research portion of this activity. Have them look up information about their selected mission, such as when it was launched, the type of mission it was, the astronauts who went on the mission and the duration of the mission. You will also need to provide them with a moon map if you'd like them to plot successful missions. When they're done, each group can share with the class what they learned.
- This is a great art activity to show students how the slight changes in the moon phases may make it look full from a great distance but up close, they'd be able to tell how significant those differences really are. Start by having students draw a portrait of themselves using oil pastels. This whole self-portrait will represent a full moon and the faces should be about five inches wide. Once they've finished that, photo copy their portraits six times. Have them cut all of the portraits out, then glue the original in the center of a 12-by-18 piece of black construction paper. They'll start cutting the other images to represent the different phases of the moon. On the left side, the first one will have just a quarter cut off the right side of the image to represent waning gibbous. The next portrait will be cut in half, representing the last quarter, with the right side cut out. The last photo on that side will just have a little sliver of the face, to represent a crescent moon. They'll do the same thing to the right side of the full face, cutting the images in the opposite way (cut the left sides of the portraits this time).
