Weather

We had a perfect week to learn about weather.  Southern California weather can be pretty boring (in a good way), warm and sunny every day.

Except...

During our week of weather we had wind, sun, rain, clouds, hail, and even a chance to play in the snow!  Real life learning is much more fun.

 

 We made it rain on our papers to watch the colors spread.  We then turned them into umbrellas.  Interestingly all the kids chose to put their clouds under the umbrella rather than on top.

We used balloons to talk about wind (blowing them up and letting them go) and about static electricity and lightning.

We talked about solids and liquids and what happens to water when it freezes.  The boys are playing with the ice and making it melt again.

We made windmills, which the kids were interested in, but they were too hard for them to blow.  I need to figure out a different way of making them.  They liked watching me blow and spin it around, but when they tried to do it, they couldn't get it to work.  

We did take advantage of the windy weather to get out the kite, which was a big hit.

 I loved the Science with Weather book.  They had great ideas for projects to do with interesting information about how things work.  It would be a good book for older kids (maybe ages 6-8?).  We also had the classic "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" and sang a lot of weather related songs:
If all the raindrops were lemon drops and gumdrops
What's the Weather
It's raining it's pouring
Rain is falling all around