Water Cycle Investigation

In Room 19 today we investigated how the water cycle works.

We discovered that the water cycle starts with the sun. The sun heats up water and the water turns into water vapour (which is just like hot air). The water rises. This is called evaporation.
When the water rises, it cools down and the water vapour changes back to water. This is called condensation. When the water joins together, it forms clouds. When the clouds get too heavy, the water falls back to the ground like rain. This is called precipitation.

Miss Fraser showed us an example. She boiled the jug. As the water became hotter, some water vapour started rising up. Miss Fraser and Luke held a bowl over the top of it. The water vapour filled the bowl then it turned back to water and stuck to the sides of the bowl. When enough water had collected, it started dripping down the sides because it got too heavy.

We also watched this video which helps explain all the tricky words like evaporation, condensation and precipitation.

With a buddy we  made our own water cycles in a zip lock plastic bag. If you want to make one at home, here is what you need to do...

Materials:

zip lock plastic bag
vivid/sharpie
piece of scrap paper (to draw your plan)
water
blue food colouring
sellotape

Method:

1. Draw a picture of the water cycle on a scrap piece of paper. When you are happy with it, draw it onto your plastic bag with a vivid.
2. Mix two drops of food colouring with 1/4 of a cup of water and pour into your plastic bag.
3. Make sure it is sealed tight!
4. Sellotape your bag to the window in a sunny spot.

Wait and see what happens...

By Miss Fraser, Luke D, Luke R, Zach, Sophie, Fin, Seth, Jade and Jazmyne.