Hi Ryan, In broad terms, "shade" is what you seek for protection from the weather elements while "shadow" is a phenomenon of darkness you observe when light is blocked by an object. Things that can provide shade (protection) include a large tree, a building or anything that can shield you from the hot sun or violent wind. Things that create a shadow (patch of darkness) include an opaque wooden board or a piece of translucent frosted glass blocking a ray of light. Shadows can come in different shades (eg darker shadow vs lighter shadow). Shade can come in many forms and sizes (eg a smaller shade under an umbrella or a large shade inside a mall. Hope this helps. Cheers, Lance

Both refer to the difference in brightness when a light source hits an object, casting a darker area on a surface. But "shade" has an additional meaning of being "a cooler spot". If I can turn this into an equation, it would be like "shade" = "shadow" + "cooler spot". There are other uses of shadow and shade (such as providing colour contrasts, like "a darker shade of blue" ), but I've just explained the most common uses for the two words.

A shadow is shape. It's the image which an object casts on to a surface when the object is positioned between that surface and a source of light. A person's shadow is the shape of that person projected onto the ground or a wall, for example. Shade is the opposite of light. On a sunny day, if you are sitting in the shade of a tree, for example, it means that you are protected from the glare of the sun by the shade that the tree provides.