I have two simple science experiments to help demonstrate how rain is made. You are the scientist / meteorologist. Make predictions of what will happen. Document the conclusion.
What you’ll need:
- 1 jar
- tap water
- shaving foam (I always use sensitive skin when working with kids, but it really doesn’t matter for this)
- blue food coloring
What to do:
- Fill the jar 3/4 full with tap water. (The water represents air.)
- Put a shaving cream cloud on top. (The cloud is the water droplets.)
- Add blue food coloring to the “cloud”. (This demonstrates water that is heavier than the cloud)
- Observe what happens when the cloud gets heavier with “water”.
Precipitation is a big part of how water moves through Earth’s water cycle.
What you will need for precipitation experiment:
- pot to heat water
- stove (this represents the sun in the water cycle)
- parent supervision
- ice
- jar
- oven mits
What To Do:
- heat up water (stove or heat source represents the sun)
- put water in jar with parent supervision
- place ice cubes on plate or in pan
- place on top of jar
- wait for condensation to occur
Rain Drops In The Water Cycle:
The sun heats up bodies of water. This water evaporates into the air turning it into water vapor. The changing of water into gas is called evaporation. Water vapor rises up into the sky, because vapors are lighter than liquids. The further you get away from the earth it gets colder, so the water vapors cool and change back into droplets. This is called condensation. Clouds are made up of water droplets. The droplets combine together inside the cloud and get heavy and drop down as rain. This process repeats over and over.