In Like A Lion and Out Like a Lamb: Spring Similes and March Metaphors

Well, not so much this year in NJ! We had an extremely calm winter (that has felt like spring at times) with only 2 days of snow where I live! We're finishing up our weather chapter in science, so I thought the theme would make the perfect bulletin board. We've also been focusing on using figurative language (especially similes and metaphors) in writing. This book is great for introducing personification too!

My March bulletin board is going to showcase our writing. Students will be drawing literal and figurative meanings of common similes and metaphors. 

Download my list of March Metaphors and Spring Similes by clicking here! 

For some lion and lamb activities, click here or on the picture.

Click the maze to download it!

Make these crafts!

Wonderful Weather

It's a beautiful February day here in New Jersey with a high of around 60 degrees. I have actually never used "beautiful" and "February" in the same sentence because it's usually freezing with snow winding down during this time of the year! We had snow really early on October 31, which was way earlier than usual, and an inch or two during one January day. That's it. It's been pretty weird weather, but I am not complaining!

I have been using a fabulous interactive website from EdHeads that helps kids learn about weather symbols and weather maps. It has three difficulty levels and is a lot of fun! Topics covered include temperature in Celsius and Fahrenheit, cloud cover, humidity, high and low pressure, precipitation, and cold and warm fronts. More advanced students can even make predictions about how quickly a weather front will move by doing some simple multiplication.

Visit the EdHeads site by clicking here!

Download my Weather Word Wall and Bingo Game here.

Weather Instruments and Layers of the Atmosphere

We have been learning about the layers of the atmosphere and why each is important. We found these pictures to be especially helpful.

The atmosphere is divided into five layers. It is thickest near the surface and thins out with height until it eventually merges with space.

1) The troposphere is the first layer above the surface and contains half of the Earth's atmosphere. Weather occurs in this layer.

2) Many jet aircrafts fly in the stratosphere because it is very stable. Also, the ozone layer absorbs harmful rays from the Sun.

3) Meteors or rock fragments burn up in the mesosphere.

4) The thermosphere is a layer with auroras. It is also where the space shuttle orbits.

5) The atmosphere merges into space in the extremely thin exosphere. This is the upper limit of our atmosphere.

We wanted to know how meteorologists know what each layer is like.

The Virtual Balloon simulates a how a weather balloon is used to collect data in the atmosphere. Students can collect information on air temperature and air pressure at different altitudes in the atmosphere. We learned that the temperature can change to get colder and warmer in different layers. If you're looking for a fun but challenging activity, have your students graph the altitudes of each layer.

Make sure to click the settings button to change the number of flights per game, data samples collected per flight, and if you really feel like a challenge, change the location and season that you collect data from!

We really love the "Weather Words" song clip because it teaches all about the instruments.