Mission to the Moon

For the orbital motion of the moon, we use the fact that the moon completes one orbit (360°) every 655 hours to set up the proportion h/655 = n/360, where h = the number of hours that have passed and n = the number of degrees that the moon has moved in its orbit.

Subject: Science, Mathematics
Topics: Earth and Environmental Sciences, Geometry, Fractions, Decimals, Percents, Ratios
Grades: 6 - 9
Knowledge and Skills:
- Can describe quantitatively the motion of the moon relative to the motion of the earth
- Can use the unit "degree" to measure or describe a position on or sector of a circle
- Can solve a proportion for an unknown

Download Activity: Mission to the Moon (PDF)

Mission To MarsMission To Mars:

How would you feel if you packed the car and hit the highway, knowing that your vacation destination would be moving continuously during your trip? As Astronaut Sidney Gutierrez explains, that's the problem planners face when sending a spacecraft to Mars.
Running time 1:47 minutes.

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