Reading the Moon's Face

Students learn to read the Moon's surface as a record of its history: dark lava maria versus older bright highlands, crater counting and overlapping craters as a way to tell relative age, Tycho's fading rays, the far side, and water ice in permanently shadowed polar craters.

Grades 5-8About 15 minutes of narrated flight, plus discussion stops8 stops

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What students will see and do

Students start at Earth looking at the Moon's face, then fly to the Moon for stops on the maria, the highlands, crater counting and Tycho, compare it with cratered Mercury, and return to the Moon's far side and polar craters. Aetherion pauses for discussion at Earth (what the light and dark patterns really are), at the Moon's 'Counting Craters' stop (which surface is older) and at Mercury (where Earth's craters went).

Learning objectives

• Describe the difference between the Moon's maria and highlands and how each formed.
• Use crater counts and overlapping craters to put surfaces in order from oldest to youngest.
• Explain why bright crater rays, like Tycho's, indicate a young crater.
• Compare why the Moon and Mercury keep their craters while Earth's craters are erased.

NGSS connections

Stops on this journey

1. The Face in the Sky (discussion stop)
2. The Dark Seas
3. The Bright Highlands
4. Counting Craters (discussion stop)
5. Tycho's Bright Rays
6. Craters Everywhere (discussion stop)
7. The Far Side
8. Ice in the Shadows

Vocabulary

• maria
• highlands
• basalt
• impact crater
• crater rays
• relative age
• far side
• permanently shadowed region