Outdoor Hour Challenge Spring Series #2
Spring Weather Observation
(Please feel free to grab the OHC Button above and put it in your blog entry or on your blog...thanks to all who have asked about it this week.)
Inside Preparation Work:
Read pages 851-854 in the Handbook of Nature Study. This section is not exactly about weather, but it ties in nicely with some springtime observations of the sun and its path. You might like to construct the Shadow Stick (page 852 #13) and make observations over the next few weeks and months with your children. At the very least, look up your sunrise and sunset times to calculate how much daylight you have now that it is spring in your area.
If you have the older edition of the Handbook of Nature Study, you need to look in the section "The Relations of the Sun to the Earth" for this week's reading. If you are using the free download from Homeschool Freebie, you need to look in Earth and Sky PDF on pages 99-102..
Bodie State Park
Outdoor Hour Time:
Your Outdoor Hour time this week can be spent making observations about the weather. Enjoy whatever spring weather you are currently experiencing and spend 15 minutes outside looking at the sky, clouds, wind in the trees, dew on the grass, mud puddles after a rain, or whatever else you can experience in your part of the world.
Suggested Observations
- Have your children describe any clouds they see in the sky.
- Notice how hard the wind is blowing by how things are moving: leaves rustling, trees bending, etc.
- Notice the wind’s direction. Where is it coming from?
- Describe the temperature of the air and/or look it up on a thermometer.
- Notice any precipitation that you may have this week: sprinkles, rain, mist, sleet, snow, fog, hail.
Follow-Up Activity:
Be sure to complete your Seasonal Weather notebook page from the Freebies Tab or from the Spring Series ebook. If you completed previous weather notebook pages, pull those out and compare the scenes you recorded in Autumn and/or Winter. Note that your days should be getting longer and any other differences you can find between the observations made in the past and now.
Mono Lake Sand Tufa with Wonderful Clouds
Extra Information on Clouds
If you observed any clouds, you might like to download this lesson plan and cloud identifier activity for your children: CloudKey.pdf. This is a handy tool to use in our cloud identification.
Weather Videos on YouTube:
Water Cycle
Our World: What is Weather? (NASA)
Please make sure to come back and post your link on Mr. Linky after completing this challenge and writing your blog entry. I always love to come by and see what you are up to!
If you would like all the Spring Series Challenges in one place, I have an ebook gathered for you to purchase for your convenience. The ebook also contains art and music appreciation plans for the spring months as well as custom notebooking pages for each of the challenges. Please see this entry for more details:
Spring Nature Study with Art and Music Appreciation
Barb-Harmony Art Mom
