1. The Water Cycle Mr. Ellis 6 th Grade Science

2. Do Now Can anyone guess just how old the water in the water fountain is?

3. Let’s Review As we already know water is constantly being recycled, but it is the process that makes it interesting. The Water Cycle* is the process of water being recycled.

4. Step One: Evaporation Evaporation* is when a liquid turns into a gas. When water evaporates, it turns into a gas. The sun heats up the water in the rivers, lakes, streams, and oceans. This heated water evaporates or turns into steam.

5. Evaporation Continued Have you ever seen steam rise from the Navesink river? This is an example of Evaporation. The evaporated water then goes into the atmosphere.

6. Question 1: What does water need in order to evaporate?

7. Navesink River Evaporation

8. Step Two: Condensation* Following evaporation, the vapor from the water is now rising in the air. When the water vapor in the air gets cool enough, it changes back into the liquid state. Often times, you can see this process when you see clouds.

9. Question 2: What does water need to condense?

10. Step Three: Precipitation* Now that the water vapor has turned back into a liquid, it needs to go somewhere. Water comes back to the earth as rain, sleet, snow, and hail. This process transports the liquid water back to Earth.

11. Precipitation

12. Collection* After precipitation, the water collects. The water collects in lakes, streams, rivers, oceans, and even in the ground. This is where the water is stored before it will eventually evaporate. Which starts the whole cycle over again.

13. Crater Lake: Collection

15. Conclusion The Water Cycle is the process of water being recycled. There are three states to water: solid, liquid, gas. There are four stages to the water cycle, evaporation, condensation, precipitation, collection.

16. Task: The Water Cycle Journey Working in small groups, you will write a short story about a drop of water during its journey. You should explain how you (the water) feels during your journey. Are you cold, hot, happy, sad, etc? Remember to write about the events. What types of challenges did you encounter? Did you hit a bump in your journey, or was it really easy, etc? Describe something exciting on your journey.

17. Groups Remember this is group WORK. Everyone is to participate. While you will be graded as a group, I will also be grading you on your ability to work as a group.