Rain {InstaScience}

We have had a lot of rain so far this fall! Which is great for filling up the aquifers, but not so great for the colors of our leaves as I shared in last week’s InstaScience on fall leaves.

Rain forms when warm, moist air rises and condenses to form a cloud of water vapor, the micro-droplets collect together to form bigger droplets which fall to the ground because of gravity.

In other words, rain is basically water falling from clouds in the sky. The typically raindrops can range in size from 1/100 to 1/10 of an inch in diameter, which is quite tiny. But all those drops can add up pretty quickly, which sometimes leads to flash flooding!

Fun Fact – The highest rainfall ever recorded was in India, where they had around 1000 inches of rain fall in one year.

LINKS TO RESEARCH

Want to learn more about rain? Check out the following articles:

• Rain & Floods – All your burning questions about rain are answered on this page from Weather Whiz Kids.
• Rain Facts for Kids – Grab some quick facts about rain at the Science Kids website.
• The Water Cycle {Video} – Watch this video about the water cycle from Met Office.

RELATED HOMESCHOOL SCIENCE ACTIVITIES

Keep the learning going with these science activities!

• Indoor Rainstorm – Have the students create a rainstorm in a glass. You will need a clear glass, shaving cream, blue food coloring, and warm water. Fill the glass halfway with warm water and squirt a shaving cream cloud on top of the water. You can pack the shaving cream in a bit before adding an indention in the center so that the food coloring won’t run over the “cloud”. Now, slowly add 20 to 30 drops of blue food coloring in the center of the shaving cream cloud. Watch and wait for the food coloring “rain” to fall out of the bottom of the shaving cream “cloud”.
• Weather Game – Play a game of “Whats the Weather” from Playdough to Plato.