Year Two30 January 2020 (by schoollogin) |
The water cycle
This week Year Two are trying to answer the question: How does it snow in the Arctic? Today, Kingfishers were engrossed in creating a simulation of the water cycle to try to explain this.
They set up a sea-bed using a glass bowl and sea shells. A smaller bowl was placed in the middle to represent an island. After that, hot water was poured into the larger bowl; this was the sea that had been heated by the sun. The whole arrangement was then covered in cling film which was the cold air in the sky. The children were fascinated as the cling-film misted up with steam and we discussed clouds forming in this way. Finally, ice was placed on top of the cling-film, above the island, in order to show what happens when the clouds hit even colder air. Everyone was amazed when we peeled back the cling film to reveal that it had 'rained' on our islands! There were some fabulous discussions about what had happened.
During this process, the children were introduced to the terms evaporation, condensation, precipitation and run-off.
Many of them stated that they would like to repeat this process at home so get the kettles on!