Facts About the Water Cycle

Facts About the Water Cycle

Here is an easy way of teaching facts about the water cycle to your students. Please read the water cycle terms and their explanation beside them. 

Evaporation: s a type of vaporization of a liquid that occurs from the surface of a liquid into a gaseous phase that is not saturated with the evaporating substance. The other type of vaporization is boiling, which is characterized by bubbles of saturated vapor forming in the liquid phase.

Precipitation: The product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravity. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, and hail.

Condensation:  is the change of the physical state of matter from gas into liquid, and is the reverse of evaporation. 

Runoff:  is the flow of water that occurs when excess stormwater, meltwater, or other sources flows over the Earth's surface.

Vapor:  is the gaseous phase of water.

Transpiration: is the process of water movement through a plant and its evaporation from aerial parts, such as leaves, stems and flowers. 

Infiltration is the process by which water on the ground surface enters the soil. 

 Percolation: refers to the movement and filtering of fluids through porous materials.

These terms were sourced through Wikipedia and amended for younger children to read.

The facts about the water cycle are easy to understand the teach in the classroom.

This is an example of the water cycle which you can teach your students.

The clouds have condensed to much, that they released rain which has fallen into the Ocean, river, lake or body of water. This water is heated up by the energy from the sun and it evaporates into a vapour which begins to form clouds. Due to other atmospheric conditions, the clouds form into larger, heavier clouds and the pressure is released in forms of sleet, know, rain, and snow. The cycle continues around and around. 

To get your set of diagrams and clip art to make your own  Facts about the water cycle, please click on this link for purchase the set. My sets are very inexpensive and I hope you enjoyed this page. 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Water-Cycle-Clip-Art-and-Diagrams-2833370

Please subscribe and rate. 

Student Choice in Their Learning

Why do children love choice in their academic work, well they just do. Think about it  if your principal asked you to do something according to the book at precisely the same time each day, wouldn't you think it's time to change it up? Well it's the same with children. They need choice. 

When I first began teaching which was about 15 years ago, I taught according to the prescribed mode. That means Reading, Writing and Math were at particular times of the day and all class members had to do the subject as I saw fit. But that is how I was trained and that's the way I thought would work. For me I found this system draining and the children themselves did not enjoy the routine day in and day out. 

During my professional development time with a particular North Auckland School we were part of a school cluster which shared information and ideas. One day we had a day of lectures, workshops and teaching which we elected to do. One of these Lectures involved an Australian Principal who explained the way her students learned and teachers taught. Essentially the students dictated the learning. They choose the curriculum subjects and objectives they wanted to learn. The teachers became facilitators rather than teachers. The students called them by their first name.
So then in my classroom I decided to try and implement these ideas into my classroom. I photocopied a number of learning sheets and wrote down a number of topic ideas for the children to choose to complete by the end of the that period. Now remember this was radical teaching for me at that stage. How did it work? It worked pretty well actually. Yes there are those kids who are unfocused and don't complete all the learning material by a set point, but what it did is it gave students choice in their learning. The students themselves told me they preferred this method because they felt they had some sense of control. For me it was great in that the class were on task, doing topics they wanted to do first and then knew what to  do once they finished. 

Fast forward 10 years and what do I see? In many classes in Hastings at least, I see a number of classes who have combined together. That means two classes as one. The students design their timetable for the day and get on with their morning or day work. If I the teacher can help I do. Of course while independent learning is going on, the teachers take reading, writing and math workshops. This enables students to opt to take classes which they feel will aid them. 

The jury is out whether I like the two classroom idea. I prefer the once classroom idea really. There just seems to be bodies everywhere in this system. It's slightly easier for the teacher because it is two people planning the classroom learning. But sometimes it's nice of have control over what it is you want to teach students yourself and not give it up to another teacher. 

New Math Resource for Pre-Kindergarten Kids

I was teaching in a Year zero or Kindergarten classroom the other day and luckily I was given heads up on what the teacher wanted to me to do. I made a couple of great one page printables where I taught the kids about healthy teeth. You can check out my page and download it for free in my Teachers Pay Teachers shop. The actual post is in the previous post.

 Math Numbers Cut and Paste Activities.

But this got me thinking, I decided to focus some of my resource making on Pre-Kindergarten as the American's like to call it or Year One's as us Kiwis like to call it. I love puzzles and cut and paste activities. So I decided to do a bit of research and found ideas about how to make puzzles and cut and paste ideas work. I made the following math activity where kids cut out the pictures and paste them on a puzzle to cut and paste and then assemble. Sure at first it will be a bit of work for the kids, but after a few, they will get the idea.

At least I know have some resources for Math for kids this age in the future. I quite enjoyed teaching these little people and I am looking forward to teaching that age group again.

Now the behaviour of some of the kids in the other classroom was another story altogether and some day I will discuss that in future blogs. Thanks for being here and viewing my blog. You can check out the 20 page Cut and Paste puzzle activities here.

Look After Your Teeth free worksheet

Hi, are you a teacher of very young children, or do you have little ones at home and you want to reinforce the notion that kids should look after their teeth, or they will get cavities and rotten teeth? Why not use the free sheet attached.

Print and have your kids cut and paste the pictures under the correct picture. It is pretty self explanatory. Have fun. This activity should take about 15 to 20 minutes with 5 year olds and that's
without coloring in.

Click on the link and it will take you to my shop for the freebie. Oh, and hopefully you'll take a sneaky look at my other products, fall in love with them and buy them. Ha, te he he.

Getting to Know You Ice Breaker

These Getting to Know you Ice Breakers are fantastic way for children to get to know each other in a safe and fair environment. These questions are kid friendly in that most kids can find another kid in class who can fit the bill.. For instance one of the questions are; "Find Someone who has brown eyes." This is pretty easy for most elementary and primary school classrooms. 

Ice Breakers done well are a great way for kids to get to know each other quickly and which is fun. Who doesn't love fun? Kids get to find out kindred spirits and appreciate the differences in other children. 

This activity should only take about 20 minutes. Once your students have written in most of the given spaces, it's time to share with the class as a whole. Have them sit on the mat or at their seats and have volunteers to give some great examples of their Getting to Know you Ice Breaker. Once again by sharing this information, children get to know each other quickly and their likes. 

I hope you enjoyed learning about this ice breaker I am sure there are other great examples out there. 

Adding Fractions

Hello Teachers

Fractions, fractions, fractions. That's right ladies and gentlemen, it is a requirement within our curriculum s that we teach fractions. Children need to understand proportions, dividing and working out amounts using fractions. Using the following clip art set we can make up our own resources and worksheets which are best suited to our students.

How to add Fractions: here is a great example how to add fractions which have the same denominator (bottom fraction see below).

How To Add When the Denominator is the same

https://www.mathsisfun.com/fractions_addition.html

I have created a simple cake clip art set best suited to Grade 3 or year 4. This set includes all the clips as seen here, including white pieces.

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Cake-Fractions-Clip-Art-2735920

Using these fractions in your worksheets are a great way to introduce your students to learning about fractions they way you want them to learn. Simply and easy to use.

It is quite tricky learning how to add when the denominator is not the same. What you need to do is to find the multiples from both of the denominators given. Find the lowest multiple of both which should be the same. See the example below.

How to Make Clip Art on Gimp