What's Your Phase?

This lesson engages students in activity to help them understand the phases of the Moon, and why they occur. Students read literature, analyze it, and then apply it to the small group performance of one cycle of the Moon’s phases.

Learning Objectives

Students will be able to describe the changes in the observable shape of the Moon by assigning a “personality” to each phase. Students will use the personality to perform the phase’s characteristics when working with an ensemble in the classroom.

Introduction

(25 minutes)

Begin with movement and sound to get students comfortable making eye contact with each other and taking cues from each other.
Have students form a circle, and explain that the class will be making sounds from space.
Start the sound activity by making a brief sound, such as whoosh, while making eye contact with the student to your right.
Tell that student to pass the eye contact and the sound to the person to his or her right.
Keep going around the circle until the sound reaches you again.
The second person now needs to make a new sound, and passes it while making eye contact.
Each subsequent student should follow the procedure until everyone has had a turn to initiate the activity.

Lesson Plan

What's Your Phase?

Grade

Subject

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Learning Objectives

Introduction