Mini Lesson Plan: The Water Cycle
Water is the most common substance on Earth. It takes up over two thirds of our planet’s surface and it supports all life.
Did you know? Water makes up almost two thirds of your body too!
The amount of water on Earth is limited — a fixed supply! But… we use so much water everyday. How have we not run out of water yet? That, young scientists, is thanks to the ‘Water Cycle’.
Activity 1: Twinkle Trails Episode 6 — The ‘Water Cycle’
Pre-video Activity: Let’s Talk About Water
Start off the lesson with some prompting questions that get the kids thinking about their pre-existing knowledge of water:
- What are some places where you can find water? E.g. lake, swimming pool, etc.
- What do we use water for? E.g. drinking, washing, cooking, etc. For this activity, it may be useful to provide worksheets for the children to fill in like the ones below.
Download Activity Sheets here: Help Ethan Find the Umbrella, and What Do We Always Use Water For?
Twinkle Trails: The ‘Water Cycle’
In this episode, Miss Twinkle and class are joined by their friend: the Water Droplet! Put on your pirate eye patches and go with the water droplet on his journey through air, water, and land around the world!
Quick Recap:
- Liquid water in oceans, rivers, and lakes evaporate to become water vapour (gas).
- When the water vapour reaches a point in the sky where it is cold enough, it condenses to form water droplets. These water droplets join together to form clouds.
- As more water droplets join the cloud, the cloud becomes heavy. When the cloud is heavy enough, the water droplets will precipitate back to earth as rain or snow.
- This cycle repeats itself over and over again.
Here’s a fun jingle to help them remember the ‘Water Cycle’!
Tune : She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain
Activity 2: Mini ‘Water Cycle’
The ‘Water Cycle’ takes place on an enormous scale. It’s not easy to observe since water vapour is colourless, and we cannot go close enough to clouds to watch condensation take place. So let’s scale it down and try to visualize it. In fact, you can recreate a mini water cycle right this very moment!
What You Will Need:
- markers
- clear ziplock bags
- water
- food colouring
- tape
Instructions:
- Ask the children to draw the water cycle on their respective Ziploc bags. They can get creative and draw anything they want in their environment besides the sun and the clouds — a giraffe, themselves — anything!
- Then, fill each Ziploc bag 1/4 of the way with water and a few droplets of food colouring.
- Tape the sealed Ziploc bags to a clear window where they can receive sunlight. This is the stage where evaporation takes place!
- After a few hours, or on the next day, you should be able to see water droplets on the insides of the Ziploc bags. The water droplets or fog at the top of the Ziploc bag is where condensation has taken place.
- The water droplets dripping down from the top is precipitation.
Activity 3: Let’s Try to Remember!
Now that the kids are well acquainted with the ‘Water Cycle’, why don’t we put their new knowledge to the test!
1. Let’s see if they can match the words to the correct processes!
2. Let’s get creative with our craft materials and draw/paint/paste out what we have learnt about the Water Cycle.
These are a few of our favourite examples of what you can create in your class!
If the children in your class make water cycle art, do take pictures and send them to us! Put your pictures up on Facebook and tag us @LittleLives, or email us at storytellers@littlelives.com for a chance to be featured on our Facebook page! We'd love to see your children’s creations!
Bonus Activity: Class Terrarium
How do we create a lasting reminder of the ‘Water Cycle’? How about we use a terrarium to create a small, self-sustaining, closed environment that demonstrates to us the concept of water being recycled everyday! Make it in class as a show-and-tell, or if your kids are older, make it with them!
In a terrarium, a small scale process of the ‘Water Cycle’ maintains a supply for the plant’s watery needs. Water it just once, and the plant will maintain itself! As for the air supply, plants undergo other processes such as photosynthesis and respiration that produce all the food and gases that a plant needs, respectively, to stay alive even in an airtight container.
For a simple tutorial on creating your own terrarium, visit Inhabitat’s DIY: How to Make Your Own Green Terrarium.
Water is our most precious resource. We use it for almost everything we do in our day to day life. So let’s use it wisely. For more Mini Lesson Plans, explore our LittleLives blog!
SOURCES
First Grade Fanatics
Inhabitat
British Council | LearnEnglish Kids
PICTURES
LittleLives Inc.
First Grade Fanatics
Fun School 4
Louisnuspace
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