Fourth Grade
Worksheets
The Seasons
Why are there changes in seasons? Why do we have winter, summer, spring, and fall? Look at a globe. The places where it is attached at the top and bottom represent the Earth's North and South Poles. The imaginary line running through the middle of the Earth between these points is called the Earth's axis. Do you see that the Earth's axis doesn't go straight up and down? The Earth's axis is tilted. The tilt of the Earth's Poles is the reason we have seasons.
Another reason is that the Earth moves around the sun. As it moves, the tilted North Pole is either pointed toward the sun or pointed away from it. In winter, the North Pole is tilted away from the sun. The northern part of Earth gets less sunlight for fewer hours each day.
The tilt causes different amounts of sunlight to reach Earth at different times of the year. In summer, the Earth's North Pole is tilted towards the sun. The Northern Hemisphere gets more direct sunlight for more hours of the day. At the same time, the South Pole it tilted away from the sun. That part of the world gets little sunlight.
