Here is just one way to bring weather concepts to life in your classroom!
In our morning greeting, the weather helper informed us that today’s weather was definitely going to be cold and rainy. It was a perfect day to explore raindrops and clouds at our rain making station.
Here’s a tip… Let them play in the rain!
Setting Up the Rain Station
As an extension of our discussions on Who Cares about the Weather?, we added a rain station to one of our tables. To set up our rain making station, I put cotton balls in one container and labeled it “clouds” and blue water in the second container and labeled it “rain.” The center naturally invited the children to use the cotton ball clouds to absorb the blue rain water and then squeeze the rain out of the clouds and back into the tub.
Building Fine Motor Skills
The children went right to work using our wooden tongs or their hands to pick up cotton ball clouds and soaking them in our blue rain water.
Expanding Weather Vocabulary
As the children explored the clouds and rainwater, we would stop by and talk with them about the words that were on the containers “rain” and “clouds” and promote discussion about how the children were using the cotton balls like “clouds” to absorb water and making their own rain as they squeeze all the water back out of the clouds.
Exploring Cause and Effect
The children came and went from the rain-making station all morning.
Enjoying the Sensory Experience
Sometimes we would have a large group gathered around having fun talking and laughing together and other times we would just have one or two children concentrating on the rain making experience.
Why we Love the Rain Making Station
This was such a simple process to put together and yet it was highly engaging and opened the door to great conversations about clouds and rain. The children used their fine motor skills to manipulate the clouds and squeeze the water and in the process, enjoyed the soothing experience of water play.
Available on Amazon
Hi! Great idea! Did the blue water stain the children’s hands?
Hi Kristen,
No, when you add a few drops of color to the water, the water dilutes the color and it does not stain hands.
Great idea. Where did you get the red tongs/ practice chopsticks?
Thank you,
Jessica
I purchased mine at our local Big Lots store but they are also available on Amazon. I painted ours red as they usually come in natural or bamboo colors.
This is such a fantastic idea Deborah! We are making rain gauges from plastic bottles this week so I will incorporate this activity too I think. Such a brilliant way to stimulate thinking and discussion…and yet so simple. Thanks for sharing!
I love the idea of combining this idea with rain gauges!
I love this idea! Where did you purchase your red plastic tongs? Thanks!
Hi Taylor,
These are actually wooden toaster tongs that I painted red:)
I LOVE this idea, Deborah! As you said, it was simple to set up but gave the children so much! 🙂 I cannot wait to try this out.
Brilliant!
Thanks for sharing this. I’m sure the children love this rain activity!
Great stuff, Deborah! Very imaginative thinking here! Hopefully the clean-up didn’t take too long!
Easiest clean up ever:)
Looks like so much fun, as usual!
🙂
Heidi Butkus
What a great Springtime activity! I can’t wait to try this with our kids!
Love this! Where did you get the containers? Thanks!
Hi Jen,
The containers are fish tanks but we use them for all kinds of different processes in my classroom:)
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