We learned about Weather {Freebies too, of course!}

The past few weeks our class has spent studying weather!  I have been really into inquiry based unit launches, so this was no exception.  I gathered the kids around the carpet with a pan, a hot plate, and 1 cup of water.  We went through the steps in the scientific process and I had them a very simple response sheet to keep their focus.  You can grab a FREE copy below!  I set the water to medium/high heat and just let nature takes its course.  Of course each kid got to feel the vapor and we discussed what we thought was happening as we continued with our graphic organizer.

The best part was at the end of the experiment when I showed them what had happened to the water! The answers were wrong.....but in that YES YOU ARE WRONG! Teacher kind of way!  I had answers like "the water went down into the stove."  "The water stuck to the pan!"  We then went into water, evaporation, and water vapor.

The next day we read out of our science text about the water cycle and connected it to the previous day's experiment.  I found these questions off of ReadWork.org, an amazing website that has tons of passages for free!

Our next step was practicing the water cycle!  I found this great cut and paste activity on, of course, TPT from Kennedy's Korner. I think if I could go back I would eliminate a few of the steps in the water cycle to simplify it. Click on the pictures below to head to her store and grab a FREE copy.

This is my ALL TIME FAVORITE water cycle video and the kids LOVE it!!!

This was probably my second most favorite thing we did (the evaporation experiment was too perfect).  I will warn you this was one of those, this sucks so bad for the teacher, but is sooo good for the kids kind of thing.  Just keeping it real.  I put the class with a partner and each group had a cold water w/ ice, cold water, warm tap water, and hot water that I heated on the hotplate.  Ok it sounds sooo much more simple now, but multiple cups of water, all varying temperatures, and 19 kids with thermometers....you can see how it was a test of my patience.  

 The kids played experimented with the thermometers and the water.  They could has sat for an hour watching the alcohol go way up and way down.  I also used pretty fancy thermometers so they shot up quick and shot down quick.  It was fun for the kids and fun for me to see them so exciting about learning!

We then discussed the temperatures we observed and added some characteristics of that type of weather.

Click on the picture above or below to grab a FREE copy!

After our tiring fun thermometer experiment we discussed all the weather tools using my weather tools interactive book.  This is for sale for just $1.00 in my TPT store!

To wrap up our study I wanted the kids to review some of the topics they studied in depth from kindergarten.  We read about each season in our science text and completed this chart over the course of a week.  It was the perfect accumulation to our study. 

 I snagged this gem from An Adventure in Literacy.  It is FREE in her TPT store!

Well there you have it!  Weather study - - - check!  If you have any good weather ideas or comments please leave them below!