Learning about the Weather with Kids

March 20, 2024 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

Springtime is prime time for learning about the weather where I live, because in the southern United States, spring tends to be the time with the weirdest weather. Kids need to know about storms and tornadoes so they can be safe, but it’s also just a fun thing to talk about as the seasons are changing and you’re moving from one kind of weather to another.

Kids at home or in the classroom can make a DIY weather station with these instructions from Inventors of Tomorrow. All of the components are things you might already have on hand, and the post has instructions for making a weather vane, an anenometer, rain gauge and thermometer for testing if its hotter or colder than it was the last time you made your observations. (Of course you can buy a weather station, too, but making measuring tools adds to the STEM fun.)

I’ve also shared instructions for making a barometer at home, which is also made with simple supplies you might already have. You can also make yourself a cloud spotter to help you predict the weather.

Little kids might enjoy having a felt weather board they can change each day as the weather changes, or check out more weather-related crafts. Printablee has a printable weather wheel you could also use to post the weather each day if you have a weather person in your classroom (or want to track it at home).

Sunshine, Hurricanes, Blizzards and Rainbows by Alix Wood (Windmill Books, 2023, suggested retail $12.75) teaches kids about the weather and includes games and activities like making your own weather chart, how to tell how far away a thunderstorm is and how to make your own frost. It talks about how to forecast the weather with science, why we have seasons, the water cycle, why wind happens and the names for different kinds of winds, why sunsets are colorful and more. It’s a good quick overview of basic concepts in weather and includes a quiz at the back of the book and lots of activities you can make copies of to keep kids entertained.

Willy and Lilly’s Adventures with Weather is a picture book written by a meteorologist (Jennifer Stanonis) that takes two kids through the seasons and all the weather they encounter. It’s a rhyming book that’s a quick read but would be a fun addition to a weather unit study or weather themed day for early elementary. It also includes a glossary of weather words in the back. (Criss Cross Applesauce, 2020, suggested retail $14.95)

Have you read?

Books About Bugs Through the Seasons

Growing Up Ladybug and How to Become a Butterfly are both by Stepanka Sekaninova and illustrated by Linh Dao, and they came out at the same time and are on similar themes, so let’s look at them together.

Growing Up Ladybug is narrated by Mariella, a seven-spot ladybug. She talks about the parts of a ladybug, where they live, different kinds of ladybugs, why humans love them, their defenses against predators and the life cycle of a ladybug.

The drawings are cute if not always scientifically accurate, it’s not in such a way that’s likely to confuse kids (who probably already know that ladybug mamas don’t push their larval babies around in strollers, for instance.

It’s a good general description of the life cycle of a lady bug and why we like having them around.

About the book: 32 pages, hardcover. Published 2026 by Albatross Media. Suggested retail price $16.95.

Similarly, How to Become a Butterfly covers the life cycle of a butterfly, starting with caterpillars eating burning nettle leaves. (Here Amanda is the narrator.) The book talks about a few of the more than 18,000 daytime butterflies in the world as well as other creatures that live in the meadow (there’s that ladybug again, along with crickets, bees and other bugs).

It also covers some of the enemies of caterpillars like wasps and spiders, and the defenses that caterpillars use to try to prevent being eaten. It illustrates how caterpillars grow and change as they molt and prepare to pupate, and what a caterpillar looks like before and while it is forming its chrysalis. And while the book uses the word metamorphasis it doesn’t really talk about what happens between the caterpillar forming a chrysalis and the butterfly hatching.

This butterfly is a peacock butterfly, and once it hatches the book covers the parts of a butterfly and the life cycle. It also talks about nocturnal moths (though it says nocturnal butterflies are “usually called moths” when moths are actually a different species) and what butterflies do at night.

I’m maybe a little hard on this book because my daughter is a butterfly expert from way back, but it is still cute and good for the very basic basics of the butterfly life cycle.

Both books would be fun additions to your bookshelf for younger kids starting to learn about different animals or who have an interest in insects.

About the book: 32 pages, hardcover. Published 2026 by Albatross Media. Suggested retail price $16.95.

Have you read?

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