When we were first asked about our opinion as to why the moon appears in different phases, I honestly had no clue what the correct answer was. I knew that it had something to do with the moon's orbit around the Earth but besides that I was completely uninformed of how it all works. So, I made an educated guess and said that I thought the reason the moon appears in phases is because the moon orbits the Earth and while it orbits only certain parts of it's face are shown due to the shadows created. Although my answer was not completely inaccurate, the way I described it was not the correct way and I soon learned that after sitting through lecture, reading about it in the textbook, and completing the at-home activity.
The common misconception that I shared with a lot of people, as discovered by the NASA website, was that "phases of the moon are caused by shadows from the Earth, clouds, or the Earth's or Moon's rotation". After learning more about what really happens in regard to the moon and it's phases, I changed my answer to the correct one. The real reason that the moon appears in different phases is the orbit of the moon around the Earth. From our perspective on Earth, we watch the moon grow from a tiny sliver, to a full moon, back to a tiny sliver, and then to nothing (new moon). The phase that the moon is in depends on it's coordinates in regard to the sun and the Earth. When the moon orbits around the Earth, we see the parts that are illuminated by the sun, and those are the different phases. Before completing this project, I wasn't too into the idea of studying the moon or learning about why it has phases because science has always been a subject that I wasn't too keen on. However, after doing the at-home activity and researching it a little more, I found that it wasn't that confusing at all and I also discovered that I have a newfound interest and love for astronomy!.
