Download The Sun and Its Family The Sun and Earth - Chapter 7

The Sun and Its Family
The Sun and Earth - Chapter 7
We have been working hard to learn about our planet Earth and its seasons. It is almost time
for our next assessment. Please use this outline and other papers from the unit to help your
child review.
Day and Night
How does Earth rotate?
Earth spins, or rotates, like a top.
Earth always spins in the same direction.
Earth’s axis is an imaginary line that goes from the North Pole to the South Pole.
What is the Sun like?
As Earth rotates, the sun shines on it.
The sun is the closest star to Earth.
What causes day and night?
It seems as if the sun is always moving across the sky, but it isn’t.
As Earth rotates, our part of Earth gets light, then dark.
The sun always shines, but it only lights half of Earth at a time.
The half facing the sun has light. The other half is dark.
It takes 24 hours for Earth to rotate all the way around.
Seasons
What causes the seasons?
As Earth rotates, it also moves in an orbit around the sun.
An orbit is the path an object takes as it moves around another object.
It takes Earth 365 days, or one year, to orbit the sun.
As Earth orbits the sun, different parts of Earth are tilted toward the sun.
This causes the seasons to change.
Why do seasons change?
When we have winter, our part of Earth tilts away from the sun.
When sunlight hits our part of Earth on a slant our part of Earth gets less light and heat.
When we have summer, our part of Earth tilts toward the sun.
When the sun is high in the sky, our part of Earth gets more light and heat.
What are seasons like in other places?
The equator separates the northern part of Earth from the southern part.
Places near the equator have the same weather most of the year.