Toddler Theme: Weather

Transition seasons like spring and fall usually usher in all kinds of wacky weather (or at least a little weather variety) and make it a perfect time to explore Weather further.  I recently learned that the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) is located here in Boulder, Colorado.  A perfect field trip for us this week!  If you aren't local, don't despair; their website is chock-full of wonderful resources like videos, simulations, games & activity ideas (check out their Learning Zone here).  We spent a whole morning exploring their public exhibits.  Mia created her own microburst storms in a special tank, made lightening, watched tornadoes form, and even touched clouds.  If you diffuse essential oils at home with an ultrasonic diffuser, then you already have access to a cloud machine.  Open it up while it's running and check it out!  You can also look to see if your local science or children's museum has a weather exhibit.

We decided to do a bunch of weather science experiments at home this week.  One day, we placed a cup out on our balcony to measure rainfall.  Nada, dry as a bone here in Denver.  Another day, I pulled out a prism and we made rainbows on the walls.  And do you remember the old tornado in a soda bottle trick?  Yup, we did that, too.  Hobby Lobby sells both the prism and the tornado tube in the science aisle.  

As a special data collection & recording activity, we called up some of our family around the country and asked them what their weather was like that day.  I also reached out to my Instagram friends so we could get more data points.  Then we recorded it all on a blank map (find one here) and created our own weather map thanks to all of our friendly weather spotters around the world.  We also took a walk around a local pond one afternoon and I was able to show Mia the wind.  Back when I was learning how to sail, I realized that you can see the wind on the water before you can actually feel it, and I was excited to teach Mia the same thing.  Can you see the wind coming across the pond towards us?

After reading the book Windblown by Edouard Manceau, we did a little windblown collage creating of our own.  I cut out shapes just like the ones in the book and Mia created animals with them.  Here's the one from last year that I've kept all this time...makes me giggle.  Or maybe you could make a wind chime with found items as well.

I'm starting to get little sister Millie involved in these theme weeks a little more so I planned a very tactile weather art project.  The goal was to create skyscapes with finger paints but not just any old paints -- weather paints.  To prep, I stuck a tray of blue & purple glitter paints in the refrigerator and then a few tubes of red, yellow & orange paints in a pot of warm water.  I set out the cold, snowy paints with the warm, sunny paints and also some watercolors & straws and let the girls paint away.  You can use the straws to blow drops of watercolor paint on the paper almost like rain drops.  Last year, Mia did a very similar painting project and then while she was napping, I doodled all over her works of art and cut them up to create a weather station.  We still use this station to this day as we check out the weather each morning.  In fact, we did another little data gathering project this week.  As Mia updated the "today" arrow each day, we also recorded it in her notepad.  At the end of the week, we made a little bar graph to summarize the data.  A nice little counting activity and it's never to early to start learning how to make sense of lots of data!  

A summary of all Weather week activities with links:

ACTIVITIES: Created our own weather station, Did several simple weather science experiments, Watched The Wizard of Oz

ART PROJECTS: Created our own Windblown inspired animals with assorted paper shapes, Created sky paintings with various weather-inspired paints (warm red, yellow & orange finger paints and cold blue and purple glitter finger paints and watercolor "rain" droplets)

OUTINGS: Visited the Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder

SNACK: Made cloud sandwiches (fluffer nutters) for lunch

BOOKS: Windblown by Edouard Manceau, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs by Judi Barrett, The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats, The Cloud Book by Tomie de Paolo

BIBLE STORY: Rainbows, a sign of God's promise

BABY BONUS: (see weather art projects above)

If you'd like to share a photo of your kid doing theme week activities, you can email it to me (email button in the left menu) or tag me on your Facebook photo or use the hashtag #weeklytoddlerthemes on Instagram (if you are private, just make sure I'm following you or tag me in the photo).