Science Unit # 5 Pacing Plan: WEATHER

Week # 2
Day 1: What Goes Up Comes Down
1. Review- Discussed what they have previously learned about water and about how clouds are formed.
2. Begin experiment:
a. Fill the cup full of water. Put shaving cream on the top to represent a cloud.
b. Have students write a prediction about what is going to happen in their notebooks.
c. Slowly add drops of food coloring to the top of the cloud. Observe what happens.
d. Have students write about what really happened in the experiment and have them include
illustrations.
3. Discuss that the water (food coloring) did not fall immediately. Explain that as the water droplets
build up into a cloud they eventually become too heavy and they fall to Earth.
4. Ask students: What do we call what falls from the clouds? Precipitation. Help the students realize that
not precipitation occurs in the form of rain.
5. Have students create a list of types of precipitation in their science notebooks.
6. Give students time to add vocabulary words to their glossary.

Day 2: Ground Water, Run-off, and Glaciers
1. Review- Discuss what they have already learned about water: evaporation turns water to a gas (water
vapor) and it rises into the atmosphere. As it gets cooler, condensation occurs and the gas turns back
into a liquid. These droplets of liquid forms clouds, and eventually precipitation occurs.
2. Ask students to brainstorm what happens next. Ask them: Where does this water go?
3. Begin experiment:
a. Fill a clear container with soil and rocks.
b. Pour water into the container and make sure it only fills the bottom. Have students observe
that the water went straight down. Explain that this is ground water.
c. Fill just below the line of soil. Have students look at the line created by the water. Tell them
that this is the water table. Below is the saturation area and above is the unsaturation area.
d. Explain what an aquifer is.
e. Show the PowerPoint presentation with the picture of ground water.
f. Ask students: Does all precipitation become ground water? What else can happen?
g. Fill the water so it goes way above the soil. Explain that this is run-off.
h. Have students describe an area where run-off may be more common. Have them think of a
city and what most of the ground consists of (concrete).
i. Display the pictures of run-off on a city street.
j. Have students try to think of what else can happen to precipitation as it falls to Earth. Have
them think of cold regions or give them an ice cube to spark their thinking.
k. Show the picture of the glacier. Ask students what happens when it melts. Explain glaciers
can lead to run-off or ground water.
4. Hand out the graphic organizer and have students complete it and paste it in their science notebooks.

Day 3: Water Cycle
1. Have students review everything they have learned about water. Have them start from the first step
and explain everything they know.
2. Ask students if they know what they just described.
3. Write the word water cycle on the board.
4. Teach and practice the water cycle song with gestures as a class.
Write the term that matches the caption. Draw a picture for each term.


















Water can be stored for a long time in
a large, slow moving mass of ice.
_______________________________
Water can be stored for a long time in
a large, slow moving mass of ice.
_______________________________
Water can also be stored
underground between the spaces of
soil particles or cracks in rocks.
_______________________________
During heavy rains, some water might
not soak into the ground. Instead, it
flows down slopes and across Earths
surface.
_______________________________


Water Cycle Song


The sun comes up,
warms up those particles,
and they evaporate.
They rise up,
way up,
brrr cold.
That water vapor,
turns back to liquid water,
because brrr cold.
That liquid water,
fills up those clouds,
and they get heavy,
precipitation;
rain, snow, sleet, hail,
back to liquid water,
to the ground.
It states all over,
its the water cycle.