Lesson Plan: A Storm Is Coming!

A guide for using our resources

Children will analyze how animals can help predict the weather.

Vocabulary: forecast, huddle, swallows

Science Focus: weather, animal behavior

Simple, spectacular ideas to boost your lessons.

• In this perfect fictional pairing, the animals on a farm react to a stormy forecast. Good listeners might even catch the vocabulary word huddle in the story!

• Help the vocabulary words from this issue really “stick” with these quick ideas!
  

huddle: Have four kids get into a huddle!
forecast: Ask, “What is the weather forecast for tomorrow?” Show kids how you can check it on a smartphone.
swallows: This is a multiple-meaning word. A swallow is a type of bird, but what else can swallow mean? Have kids act it out.

• Use pages 2-3 of the issue to do this scavenger hunt as a group.

1. Find the picture where the butterfl y is hiding. Put a ✓on it.

2. Which word names a type of bird? Underline it.

3. What are the frogs saying? Circle the words that tell you.

4. Look at the forecast in the sidebar. Put an ✘ on the symbol that means “sunny.”

Skill: observing and predicting

Materials: pine cones, temporary adhesive or modeling clay

• The first step in this super-simple experiment is to gather pine cones from outdoors! When you have a few, set them up on a windowsill outside, but make sure you can see them from inside. To make sure the cones stay upright, attach them to the sill using a little removable adhesive or modeling clay.
• Look at your row of pinecones every day and use them to predict the weather! When the weather is dry, the pine cones open up; when it’s going to rain, they close!