... Bad Astronomy . Misconceptions . ... Bad Astronomy : The Moon only shows one face to us because it is not rotating. Better astronomy : The Moon only shows one face because it is rotating, once every time it revolves around the Earth. ... Place the Moon model on the table about 30 centimeters (one foot) away with the X facing the Earth model. ... You'll see that to keep the X facing the Earth model, you have to rotate the Moon model as it goes around the Earth model . ... 2008 Phil Plait. ...