--- title: Phases, eclipses and tides — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Phases, eclipses and tides», a lesson of the space course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: The Sun always lights half of the Moon, like a lamp lighting half of a ball; as the Moon goes round us we see more or less of that lit half, and --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Space](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/) / Phases, eclipses and tides # Phases, eclipses and tides Lesson 7 of the space course of Mova's primary school: 17 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/0/) — The Sun always lights half of the Moon, like a lamp lighting half of a ball; as the Moon goes round us we see more or less of that lit half, and these are the phases. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/1/) — The phases are not the Earth's shadow; the Earth's shadow touches the Moon only in a lunar eclipse, which happens at full Moon and can turn it coppery red. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/2/) — In a solar eclipse the Moon slides between us and the Sun at new Moon and covers it; because the Moon's path is tilted, this does not happen every month. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/3/) — The Moon's gravity also tugs the oceans into bulges, so the sea goes in and out twice a day, and at new and full Moon the Sun helps pull to make the biggest spring tides. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/4/) — Never look at a solar eclipse with bare eyes or ordinary sunglasses; use proper eclipse glasses or a pinhole projector. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/5/) — The Moon's phases happen because we see different amounts of its sunlit half as it orbits the Earth. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/6/) — The cycle from new Moon through first quarter, full Moon and last quarter back to new Moon takes about 29.5 days. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/7/) — A growing Moon is waxing and a shrinking one is waning, and from Britain a waxing Moon is lit on its right side. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/8/) — The phases are not caused by the Earth's shadow; this is a common mistake. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/9/) — A solar eclipse happens when the Moon passes between the Sun and the Earth and blocks the Sun's light, which can happen only at new Moon. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/11/) — The red colour comes from sunlight bent through the Earth's atmosphere onto the Moon, like all the world's sunsets at once. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/12/) — We do not get eclipses every month because the Moon's orbit is tilted about 5 degrees to the Earth's orbit. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/13/) — You must never look at a solar eclipse with your bare eyes or ordinary sunglasses, only with proper eclipse glasses or a pinhole projector. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/14/) — The oceans have two high tides and two low tides roughly every day, caused mainly by the Moon's gravity. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/15/) — Spring tides, with the biggest range, happen at new and full Moon, and neap tides, with the smallest range, at the quarter Moons. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/16/) — Spring tides have nothing to do with the season of spring; they happen all year round. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/7-phases-eclipses-and-tides/17/) — The Bristol Channel and Canada's Bay of Fundy have some of the biggest tides in the world, over 12 metres. - ← previous: [The Moon](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/6-the-moon/) - next →: [Mars](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/8-mars/) - ↑ back to [Space](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/space/)