W is for Weather: Themed Activities

 Switching it up a little after my holiday...during which the weather was absolutely wonderful by the way!😎  The letter of the week will start with the theme on Saturday, then Tuesday and Thursday W topics will follow.  

W-Water- Is it raining? Is there a flood?  You can look into types of clouds and which ones accompany various types of rainfall and discover what determines an area to be prone to be a flood zone.  You can make a rain stick with a paper towel roll with beans, seeds or beads inside and closed on either side.  You can decorate a can and mark off measurements and leave it out in the rain to measure the amount of rainfall.  Other ideas are to do water painting or to glue cottonball cloud designs onto cardstock.

E -Earthquake- What makes the ground shake during an earthquake?  Can you build a structure on a tray and shake the base.  Is it stable enough to remain standing or does it crumble to the ground?  Build with a variety of materials and see which ones are the most stable.

A Altitude-How high can you jump? Can you climb any higher?  Do you know that the higher you go the colder the air gets?  It was amazing in the plane to realize that it was -58 outside!  How can it fly when it is so cold? I wonder how cold it is outside when a rocket reaches outer space?  Now that is crazy altitude!! When we were in the mountains, we would reach a spot and the temperature would just drop significantly.  Talk about the impact of that on plant and animal life as you ascend the mountains. There are so many interesting details about altitude to discover.

T Temperature.  This one is straight forward.  Hot or cold?  Categorize things as to where they belong....ice cream? lake water? tea? sun? snow? ice cubes? fire? glacier? desert? and so forth.

H Hurricanes and Tornadoes.  Toy stores sell a piece to connect two water or pop bottles together.  Fill one side half way with a liquid.  You can add food colouring or sparkles to it if you want.  The idea is that you start the water swirling and then flip it over and watch a tornado in a bottle happen.  Many kids find this mesmerizing and it is a great introduction to a study of hurricanes and tornadoes.  Usborne has a great book on the topic too if you are looking for something specific.

E Evaporation.  It is the opposite of condensation.  The two processes occur with fluctuations in the weather.  In the freezer, on the stove, by the windows....search and find ways to experience these phenomena in your environment.  The water cycle is part of the school curriculum in Ontario so becoming familiar with aspects of it now will benefit their studies later.

R Rainbows.  What a nice way to end.  God introduced the rainbow in the sky after the flood.  Apart from the many spiritual lessons to learn here It is often used to teach colours and matching items in your world to the colours on a rainbow is a great activity to do with your children.  Creating rainbows with prisms, drawing them, making rainbow ribbon crafts and so on are activities to add on to the lessons of when and why rainbows appear in the sky.

Have fun learning with the child(ren) in your life!