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Chapter 1
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Satellite | An object that orbits the planet |
| Planet | An object that orbits a star, is large enough to have become rounded by it's own gravity, and has cleared the area of it's orbit. |
| Meteor | A streak of light in the sky produced by the burning of a meteoroid in Earth' s atmosphere. |
| Comet | A loose collection of ice and dust that orbits the sun, typically in a long narrow orbit. |
| Star | A ball of hot gas, primarily hydrogen and helium, that undergoes nuclear fusion. |
| Constellation | A pattern or grouping of stars that people imagine to represent a figure or object. |
| Axis | A imaginary line that passes through a planet's center and it's north and south poles, about which the planets rotate. |
| Rotation | A spinning motion of a planet on it's axis. |
| Revolution | The movement of a object around another object. |
| Orbit | The path of an object as it revolves around another object in space. |
| Calender | A system of organizing time that defines the beginning, length, and divisions of the year. |
| Solstice | Either of the two days of the year on which the sun reaches it's greatest distance north or south of the equator. |
| Equinox | Either of the two days of the year on which neither hemisphere is tilted toward or away from the sun. |
| Force | A push or pull exerted on an object. |
| Gravity | The attractive force between objects; the force that moves objects downhill,. |
| Law of universal gravitation | The scientific law that states that every object in the universe attracts every other object. |
| Mass | The amount of matter in an object.. |
| Weight | A measure of the force of gravity on an object. |
| Inertia | The tendency of a object to resist a change in motion. |
| Newton's first law of motion | The scientific law that states that an object at rest will stay at rest and a object in motion will stay in motion with a constant speed and direction unless acted on by a force. |
| Phase | One of the different apparent shapes of the moon as seen from earth. |
| Eclipse | The partial or total blocking of one object in space by another. |
| Solar eclipse | The blocking of sunlight to earth that occurs when the moon is directly between sun and earth. |
| Umbra | The darkest part of a shadow. |
| Penumbra | The part of the shadow surrounding the darkest part. |
| Lunar eclipse | The blocking of sunlight to the moon that occurs when the earth is directly between the sun and the moon. |
| Tide | The periodic rise and fall of the level of water in the ocean. |
| Spring tide | The tide with the greatest difference between consecutive low and high tides. |
| Neap tide | The tide with the least difference between consecutive low and high tides. |
| Maria | Dark, flat areas on the moon's surface formed from huge ancient lava flows. |
| Crater | A large round pit caused by impact of a meteoroid. |
| Meteoroid | A chunk of rock or dust in space , generally smaller than an asteroid. |