Water Cycle Playdough Craft for Kids: Explore Evaporation & Rain

What You'll Need

• Paper plate

• Blue playdough (for water and clouds)

• Brown playdough (for land)

• Green playdough (for hills/trees)

• Yellow playdough (for sun)

• Orange marker (optional, for sun rays)

Getting Started

Gather all your materials in a clear workspace. Explain to your child that you'll be creating a model of the water cycle, which shows how water moves all around us, from the ground to the sky and back again!

How to Do This Activity

• Create the Ocean/Lake: Take a generous amount of blue playdough and flatten it onto the bottom left side of the paper plate to represent a large body of water, like an ocean or lake.

• Form the Land: Use the brown playdough to create land next to the water. Shape it to look like hills or mountains, covering about half of the paper plate.

• Add a River: Roll a thin strip of blue playdough and lay it across the brown land, connecting it to the larger body of water to show a river flowing.

• Build the Hills/Trees: Use the green playdough to create small hills or trees on top of the brown land.

• Make the Sun: Take the yellow playdough, roll it into a ball, and flatten it slightly to make a sun. Place it in the upper left corner of the paper plate. Use the orange marker to draw sun rays radiating from it.

• Shape the Clouds: Take more blue playdough and mold it into several cloud shapes. Place them in the upper right corner of the paper plate, above the land and water.

• Discuss the Cycle: As you create each element, discuss its role in the water cycle. For example, the sun heats the water (evaporation), the water turns into vapor and rises to form clouds (condensation), and then falls back down as rain (precipitation).

Tips for Parents

• Use simple language to explain complex concepts. For example, "The sun makes the water warm, and it goes up into the sky like steam from a kettle!"

• Encourage your child to describe what they are making and why each part is important.

• Ask open-ended questions like, "What happens after the rain falls?" or "Where does the river water go?"

• Reinforce vocabulary words like 'evaporation,' 'condensation,' and 'precipitation' throughout the activity.

Ways to Extend

For older children or more engagement:

• Add Labels: Write small labels for 'Sun,' 'Clouds,' 'Ocean,' 'River,' 'Evaporation,' 'Condensation,' and 'Precipitation' and have your child place them on the model.

• Draw Arrows: Use a marker to draw arrows on the paper plate to show the direction of water movement in the cycle.

• Create a Story: Encourage your child to tell a story about a drop of water as it travels through the water cycle.

• Experiment: Conduct a simple experiment like boiling water to show steam (evaporation) or placing a lid over a pot of boiling water to show condensation.