What Causes Tides to Ebb and Flow?

The big ocean goes up and down because of the moon pulling on it like a toy string.

Imagine you have a bucket of water, and you're holding a small ball near it, that’s like the moon. When you move the ball closer to the bucket, the water gets pulled toward it. That's what happens with the real ocean: when the moon is close, it pulls the water up, making a high tide.

Now picture two buckets of water, one next to you and one across the room. If you have a ball near both buckets, they both get pulled a little. But if the moon moves far away from one bucket, that bucket loses some pull and goes down, that's a low tide, or when the ocean ebbs.

Sometimes the sun also helps out, like a bigger friend joining in the pulling game. When the sun and moon both pull on the same side of Earth, it makes an especially high tidal wave, called a spring tide, kind of like when you have two friends tugging your shirt at once!