Basics of Astronomy Worksheet

SCI/151 Version 6

University of Phoenix Material

Basics of Astronomy Worksheet
Complete the table based on the readings for this week: Ch. 14 of The Essential Cosmic
Perspective.
Term or concept

Definition and explanation

The Universe
1. What is Earths Sun, and what is its role in the
solar system?
2. What is the Milky Way galaxy and the suns
position in it?
3. What is the Big Bang, and what does it say
about the age of the universe?
4. What is meant by the phase looking out in
the universe is looking back in time?
Location in the Universe
5. What is Earths place in the solar system?
6. How close are the nearest stars to the Sun
as compared to the distance between the
Sun and the Earth?
7. How large is the Milky Way galaxy?
8. How many stars are estimated to exist in this
galaxy?
9. How old is the earth compared to the
universe itself?
Motion in the Universe
10. How fast does the Earth move around the
Sun? Compare that to fast things in day-today life.
11. How is the Sun moving in the galaxy?
12. How are the galaxies around the Milky Way
galaxy moving from humans point of view?
Significance of the Celestial Sphere
13. What important directions and coordinate
systems help you find your way around the
sky?
14. Why do stars have different levels of
brightness, and how does one describe their
brightness as compared to one another?
15. What are constellations?
16. What is Polaris, and what is its significance in
the sky?
17. Why does the Moon change its phase, how
does it move, and how do these combine to
create eclipses?

Copyright 2015, 2013 by University of Phoenix. All rights reserved.

Basics of Astronomy Worksheet

SCI/151 Version 6
History of Astronomy
18. What is the science of astronomy?
19. What is the scientific method, and how does it
relate to the science of astronomy?
20. Who was Aristotle, and what was his
relationship to the science of astronomy?
21. What was the Copernican revolution?
22. What observations did Galileo make that
proved that planets go around the Sun?
23. What laws tell about how the planets move
around a star?
Seasons of the Earth
24. How does the Earth rotate, and how does
that relate to day and night or the seasons?
25. How does the Earth revolve, and how does
that relate to day and night or the seasons?
26. What causes the seasons? Is it the tilt of the
Earths axis or its changing distance from the
Sun throughout the year?
Gravity, Free Fall, and Orbits
27. What is gravity, and how much weaker does it
get as you get farther from the center of a
body?
28. Are objects in orbit of the Earth still under the
influence of gravity?
29. An object in orbit falls around the Earth. What
do planets, comets, and asteroids fall
around?

Copyright 2015, 2013 by University of Phoenix. All rights reserved.