Seasons - Earth's Tilt

Seasons

4.E.3B.4: Students will be able to describe the factors (including tilt, revolution, and angle of sunlight) that result in Earth’s seasonal changes. 

We learned that

• Earth rotates

• Earth revolves around the Sun

• Earth has a tilt

Simulation Video

https://scetv.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/psu10phy.sci.seasons/seasons/  

The Tilt

• Earth’s axis is tilted at a 23.5° angle.

• Earth revolves around the Sun in an orbit that takes 1 year.

• Earth’s axis is always tilted in the same relative direction, regardless of where the Earth is in its orbit around the Sun. 

Tilt

• Earth is a sphere with a curved surface. 

• The Earth’s orbit around the sun is NOT a perfect circle. It is an ellipse.

• Earth rotates around an imaginary straight line called an axis that runs through the planet’s center from the North Pole to the South Pole.

Tilt continues

• The tilt of the axis causes the hemispheres to point toward or away from the Sun at different times during the Earth’s revolution around the Sun. 

• As Earth revolves around the Sun, the intensity of sunlight varies on different parts of the Earth depending on the tilt of the axis and the curved surface of the Earth. 

Video: Why Do We Have Different Seasons? | California Academy of Sciences

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgHmqv_-UbQ

• Seasons are not caused by how close the Earth is to the sun. 

• When neither the northern nor the southern hemispheres are tilted towards the Sun, sunlight falls equally on both hemispheres resulting in autumn or spring. 

The Four Seasons

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6SSOoEMwAA

Multiple Choice

What does the earth's tilt cause?

• The seasons

• Day and Night

• Tsunamis

• Earthquakes

Multiple Choice

If its ____ in the Northern hemisphere, then its summer in the Southern hemisphere.

• spring

• fall

• winter

• summer

Multiple Choice

The axis of the Earth runs through its center from the ______ to the ________.

• West, East

• North Pole, South Pole

• East, West

• North Pole, West

Multiple Choice

Earth is a tilted planet. What is the degree of tilt?

• 23.5 degrees

• 25.3 degrees

• 30.2 degrees

• 24 degrees

Multiple Choice

One rotation of Earth is equal to

• a day

• a month

• a year

Multiple Choice

How long does the earth takes to make a complete orbit around the sun?

• 1 day

• 5 years

• 1 year

Multiple Choice

The seasons change as the Earth _________ around the sun.

• revolution

• rotation

• observation

Multiple Choice

What happens when the area in which you live tilts away from the sun?

• its summer

• its fall

• its winter

• its spring

Multiple Choice

What happens when neither of the hemispheres are tilted toward the Sun, but its sunlight falls equally on both hemispheres?

• Seasons would be the same.

• Seasons would be more extreme.

• There would be no seasons.

• Seasons will be autumn and spring.

Multiple Choice

The Earth's axis tilts in _________direction, regardless of where the Earth is in its orbit around the Sun.

• no

• a different

• the same