Explore Weather: Elementary Homeschool Unit Study

I have a bachelor's and master's in education, taught in public schools for 9 years, and am entering my sixth year of homeschooling. I LOVE Knowledge Crates because of how easy they make it for me to homeschool in the style that works for our family. With a Knowledge Crate and a library card, we're off to the races!

We piloted this weather unit study this summer to test it out for Knowledge Crates. Doing it in the summer ended up being a great testament to how FUN these Knowledge Crates units are ... the activities were so engaging that I didn't get even one comment about how "but it's summer break, why are we doing school?!" 😂 My 8.5-year-old son, who is a total bookworm, also dove right into the book selections for this unit when I laid them out and was immediately sucked in in the best of ways.   😊 

Now that you know a bit about me and my learners, let's take a look at this weather unit!

The Explore Weather Elementary Homeschool Unit Study comes with this fantastic activity guide that's got all of the activities listed with instructions, materials (all of which are also included in the crate), learning areas, and questions to ask your child to foster critical thinking and connection to the topics.

The first thing I do when I get a homeschool elementary unit study crate is take out this guide and make a rough plan of how I'll spread out the activities for our unit. I thought this weather unit made sense spread over six weeks, with weather observation and the yearlong culminating art project continuing throughout the year.

Before I show you how I planned out this weather unit, please remember this is just my suggestion for our homeschool. There's no "right" pace; it really depends on what kind of pace and rhythm you have in your homeschool. This is just one possible way to do it, my friends!

• Assemble our mini weather station
• Learn how to observe and record daily weather data
• Weather vocabulary word search
• Weather sensory play

• Exploring air pressure with experiments
• Follow the wind bubble play
• Make a sensory wand
• Tornado in a bottle

• Water cycle in a bag experiment
• Rain cloud in a cup activity
• Cloud detective outdoor observation
• Cotton swab cloud painting

• Lightning storm luminary
• Rainbow scrape painting
• Color-changing solar bead creations
• Mixed media sun art

• Making polymer snow
• Snowflake symmetry quilt square
• Coordinate graphing mystery pictures
• Addition + subtraction game

• Read Can You Survive the 1900 Galveston Hurricane? with family and friends trying out different choices and endings
• Learn how to graph monthly weather data
• Start Weather Tree yearlong art project

Throughout those six weeks, we read all the books that came in the weather unit study crate (it even suggests in the guide which books/pages to read with each activity). We also got some more books from the library and looked for cool PBS Kids shows with weather themes, too.

The other great thing about the Activity Guide for this elementary homeschool weather unit is that it's written to be used by both the parents and the kids, so if you've got an independent learner who wants to do a certain activity on their own, they can just use the guide and off they go!

Now let's take a look at all of this in action! 

My son thought he was pretty hot stuff with his very own weather station! This weather unit is built around a mini weather station kit from 4M that comes included in the weather unit study crate—the crate even contains the drink bottle you need for the base!

The mini weather station was pretty quick and easy to assemble and was a fun activity in itself. The kit includes a functional wind vane, an anemometer (for wind speed), a thermometer, and a rain gauge for measuring local weather conditions. As we built it, we talked about what each of the tools measures and how they work.

We decided to keep our mini weather station outside on our patio table during our weather unit. The kids got so excited every time there was a good breeze and the anemometer would start "going crazy"! 😂

This beautiful weather station observation notebook is a tool used throughout this weather unit to track the daily weather data from the mini weather station. I think it's a really neat habit to establish of the kids checking the weather station every day and recording our weather conditions. On the monthly calendar page, we write down the day's high temperature (we looked this up on my weather app on my phone) and colored in the day's square according to the dominant kind of weather for the day (sunny, cloudy, rainy, etc.).

In addition to recording the daily weather, the observation notebook for this weather unit also has some great data interpretation activities at the end of each month. The kids will look at the daily data they gathered and represent it in both tally and bar graph form. They'll also draw a few reflection pictures about that month's weather.

During this first week of the weather unit we're really just trying to understand the basics of weather observation and the vocabulary that we'll use throughout the unit. This reusable word search (it's a dry-erase sheet) is a fun way to reinforce that vocabulary.

There are a few options for sensory play that come in this weather unit study crate, one of which is a few cans of colorful playdough and these fun chunky weather shapes. The day we played with these, we had a friend over and she was amazing at coming up with silly weather stories she acted out for my kids using the weather shapes in the dough! 

We started off this week of our weather unit with an exploration of air pressure. We read about air pressure in The Ultimate Kid’s Guide to Weather (book included in the unit study crate) and then did three cool experiments. I framed these as science magic tricks, which added to the excitement!

First we did a "waterproof paper towel" experiment. We crumbled up a paper towel in a cup, submerged the cup upside down in a bowl of water, and then lifted the cup back out to find the paper towel was still dry! So cute how this just blew their minds. 😂 We talked about how the air pressure inside the cup pushes the water away, keeping it from entering the cup and wetting the paper towel. Science magic!

Our next activity was the "floating plate" experiment, which was definitely the kids' favorite! You fill a cup halfway with water, hold a paper plate on top with your hand, then flip the whole thing over ... take away your hand under the plate and it floats seemingly in midair! Water surface tension makes a seal, which combines with air pressure to create "magic." 

For our final air pressure experiment in our weather unit, we learned you can't add more air to a bottle already filled with air by trying to fill the "impossible balloon." We experienced the difference by first blowing into a balloon normally and seeing it inflate, and then putting it inside the bottle and seeing how we couldn't make it inflate.

We continued our exploration of air as we moved on to wind, reading about wind in our books and then "seeing" it in action by playing outside with bubbles (even the bubble wand came in the weather unit crate!).

I prompted the kids to blow into the wind, away from the wind, up, down, etc. to see how the bubbles traveled. We then had some friendly competitions to see whose bubbles could travel the farthest before popping!

Okay, this next activity was SO FUN and pretty! Once our bubble wands were empty, we repurposed them into beautiful sensory wands! The weather unit crate came with confetti, glitter, UV color-changing beads, and rainbow beads that we put in our wands. Then you add some clear glue (also came in the crate, so convenient!) and fill the rest of the way with water. 

The kids had fun making these, and I enjoyed how it kept them engaged for more than just a few minutes as they put the tiny items in their tubes. This gave me some "me time" to work in my garden. 😊

The glue slows down how the objects move throughout the tube, which creates a really soothing effect to watch as you flip your wand around. It didn't take long for these to become magic wands as the kids chased each other around the yard casting "spells" on each other. 😆

This might have been my personal favorite activity from the weather unit. The wands are just soooo pretty to look at, and I like how they just became an addition to our outside open-ended  toys.

I don't think any weather unit can be complete without making a tornado in a bottle! The weather unit study crate provides both the bottles and the connector piece. 🙌 It took us a few tries to get the hang of spinning the bottles in the right way to form the cyclone, but once we did it was VERY cool to watch! 🌪️

We added glitter because I thought it would make the tornado even cooler, but it actually made it harder to see. Leave the glitter out!

Another weather unit essential? The water cycle in a bag experiment! We drew and labeled the water cycle on a ziploc bag and filled it with about an inch of colored water. Hang it in a sunny window (our weather unit crate even includes the heavy-duty glue dots to do this!) and watch over the next hours and days. Your kids will get to see how the water evaporates and condenses higher in the bag and "rains" back down to the bottom. Very cool visualization!

Another fun experiment in this weather unit to help kids understand science concepts is making a rain cloud in a cup. First we read about how rain is formed in our 100 Questions about Extreme Weather book, then we did this experiment.

You simply fill a cup partway with water, then spray a layer of shaving cream on top. The kids use a dropped to add colored water to the shaving cream cloud, and when it gets too "full" and "heavy", you can see the "rain" come down into the cup. They really enjoyed this one!

I think every kid knows what it's like to look into the sky and find fun shapes in the clouds. With this activity in the weather unit, kids can take their cloud-spotting skills to the next level by becoming cloud detectives! The weather unit study crate includes cloud cards detailing seven of the most common types of clouds. Kids and their grown-ups can then use the cards to identify the clouds you see in the sky!

You might like to keep your cloud cards from this weather unit in the car, by your back door, next to a bedroom window, or in a hiking backpack. Whenever you're outside, use your cards to figure out what types of clouds are in the sky. Over time, you may find yourself able to identify some types of clouds all on your own!

Check out this beautiful cloudy sky art project! The weather unit activity guide walks the kids step-by-step through painting this really impressive scene. The kids get to make the clouds by dabbing a bunch of cotton swabs tied together, and the painting looks so professional after the last step shows them how to add shading to the bottom of the clouds to make them look more realistic. This project is fun to make and really turns out lovely!

I know I've already said this too many times for you to be taking me seriously at this point 😂, but THIS craft from the weather unit might really just be my favorite!

It's a lightning storm luminary made from decoupaging tissue paper on the inside of a plastic cup! Glue some cotton balls on top (well, the bottom, as the cup is upside-down) and place over an LED tealight, and it glows in a flickering way that makes it look like a lightning storm! ⚡

This is SO, so pretty and looks awesome in the dark. I told the kids that we should keep this handy and use it as a special tradition whenever the power goes out!

This art project is SO COOL! So fun to make, and it looks gorgeous when it's done. (Really, the art in this weather unit is all so awesome!)

We used glossy paper so the paint would slide really well, dolloped paint all over the top third of the paper, then just took a flap off a shipping box and used it to slowly scrape the paint down the paper. When all the paint was at the bottom, I scraped it back upwards again to add another layer. It was a strangely satisfying feeling to make this 😂 and came out so nice. At home, we used a permanent marker to write a rainbow quote over the dried painting. You could also have your kids write their name, draw a picture, or just leave it as is. 🌈 

Ahhhh, these color-changing solar beads!!! They are such a WOW! These pony beads change color in UV light, so they're a perfect complement to learning about the sun in our weather unit!

I snapped the first picture below as soon as my son opened his hands to get a picture quick before the beads changed color, and then in the second one you can see how they're changing. The stronger the sun, the more vibrant the colors!

We made bracelets for ourselves and friends and family. The beads ALSO glow in the dark, so they're fun at night, too!

I LOVE when the Knowledge Crates team comes up with upcycling projects that use the box itself as a project (they did this with the diorama in the rainforest unit and the recycled materials animal in the environment unit, too).

In this weather unit, the kids use the Knowledge Crates box to make this bright, gorgeous sun project. I love the texture and how the kid can add details that pop off the surface.

Have your kids ever done coordinate graphing mystery pictures? We discovered this activity this past school year when my son started learning first-quadrant graphing in his second-grade math curriculum. His puzzle-minded brain LOVED plotting points, so I found him some hidden picture graphing activities online. 

He LOVED them, so as we were planning this weather unit at Knowledge Crates, I thought it would be fun to include this kind of math activity for the first time in a unit study crate. I created these graphing sheets, and I hope your kids like them as much as mine does!

I get particularly delighted when we find ways to include math in Knowledge Crates units. For this weather unit we made the coordinate graphing pictures above, and then also this roll and practice addition and subtraction activity.

On these dry-erase activity sheets, one is addition and the other is subtraction. For each math problem, one number is missing, so kids roll the dice, fill in the missing number with what they rolled, and then solve. This is great because you can reuse the sheet over and over and it's never the same because the problems depend on what the kids roll. The element of rolling the dice makes this feel more like a game and less like math drills. 😊

This week when we read about snow in our books from the weather unit crate, we added in sensory play with instant snow that the kids mixed up (included in the crate!). It's always so amazing (for both the kids and adults!) to see how a tiny packet of powder magically puffs up into a bowl full of snow. We put it in the fridge for a bit before we play to make it feel even more like real snow. 

Back to my love of incorporating math in cross-curricular units like this weather unit 😍 ... in this snowflake quilt square art project, we talked about symmetry, specifically radial symmetry. I told the kids to think about a starfish or a snowflake: you can rotate those objects in a circle and still see the same design without it seeming upside-down or sideways.

We then practiced creating radial symmetry by painting a snowflake in the style of a quilt square. If you have multiple kids, or just want to make multiple squares, it would be fun to display them together in a grid like a real quilt!

During our last week in our weather unit, we had a blast reading Can You Survive the 1900 Galveston Hurricane? multiple times throughout the week as a family.

We're familiar with this choose-your-own-adventure genre after reading another one from this series during our desert unit. My son loves both reading these books on his own, and reading them aloud to us and having us choose story points that result in different endings. It's a fun family activity that little sister loves getting in on, too!

As we wrapped up this weather unit, it was about time to do our monthly data interpretation and reflection in our weather observation notebook. The notebook comes with enough pages to keep this practice up for a whole year!

The culminating project for this weather unit is this super unique piece of art the kids will create called a weather tree.

Have you ever seen how knitters or crocheters make weather blankets, where each row represents the temperature on the day they made it? A weather tree is kind of like that ... there is a branch for each month and leaves for each day, and the kids will color each leaf using the key at the bottom to represent that day's high. This gives them another way to use the data they've been collecting and a beautiful artistic representation of all the observation they've been doing throughout the weather unit.

I would suggest coloring in the leaves at the end of each month, at the same time you interpret that month's data in your observation notebook. Find a prominent place to keep your weather tree hung up, and watch it bloom over the next year!

I put together a BIG list of books to go with this weather unit study that you can look up at your library and use throughout the weather unit. There are both picture books and chapter books on the list.

You can get a free printable PDF version of the weather unit booklist here, or head over to the same list on Amazon if that's more convenient for you.

One of my favorite things about homeschooling as a way of life is the "family style" approach of learning, when the whole crew, littles and big kids, can enjoy exploring a unit together and in their own way. 

My five-year-old did a bunch of the activities from the elementary weather unit study crate with us, but there's also a full Explore Weather: Preschool Edition crate that has its own set of 20+ activities about weather. 

If you've got a preschooler or kindergartener, you'll want this version. We were lucky enough to do both, and if you'd like to do that, too, you can add either of the full crates to your cart, and you'll be prompted to add the other one for a great discount. The more you know! ☺

Did you notice this Rainbow Reactions Science Lab kit from Learning Resources? This kit is $19.99 retail but it comes included in the preschool weather unit crate! Amazing! The kids get to do a lot of fun hands-on experiments using this kit, like creating a rain cloud, rainbow volcano, color mixing, and more. It's such a cute, sturdy set and I love how it gets used throughout the unit.

My daughter's favorite art activity from the preschool weather unit was this windy day hair painting. She drew a face, mixed up watercolors, used a dropper to dot paint over her face's head, and then used a straw to blow the paint into crazy hair. She just LOVED this!

The preschool weather unit crate also includes gorgeous books, a full set of 8 Crayola play doughs, puffy paint snowman art, the sensory bubble wand activities, and lots more. You can see the full activity list over here. ☔

Thank you so much for letting me share all about our experience doing this weather unit study! It's one of my favorites we've done because of the beautiful art projects and wow-worthy experiments.

The ready-to-go resources we used are listed below. I hope you and your kids have as much fun as we did! ⛅☔ 🌈