Why is Ozone So Dangerous?
Learn more about ozone pollution and how you can help reduce it.
What's the Polar Vortex?
Learn about the polar vortex and the polar jet stream and how we can get particularly chilly winter weather in the mid-latitudes when the air circulating around the North Pole wobbles to the south.
What Makes a Bomb Cyclone
A bomb cyclone can cause cold and stormy winter weather. Watch this video to discover what makes a bomb cyclone.
Why the Wind Blows
Learn how air pressure in the atmosphere causes wind.
What's With Weather Fronts?
Discover how a weather front can cause clouds and storms with rain or snow.
What Makes Snowflakes Take Shape?
Do you know that snowflakes are different shapes? Find out why some snowflakes have simple shapes and others are more intricate.
Warming Water, Rising Seas
You may know that melting glaciers and ice sheets is causing sea levels to rise. Did you also know that the ocean absorbs heat, causing it to expand? Learn more about this process and how it’s impacting coastlines around the planet.
The Shape of Raindrops
Did you know that raindrops are not shaped like teardrops? They actually look like tiny hamburgers falling through the sky. Watch this video to learn why!
No Two Hurricanes Are Alike
When there is a hurricane or tropical storm heading towards the coast, get to know all about it to learn what hazards it could cause.
Meet a Tornado
Learn what makes a tornado a tornado, and how these powerful storms can cause property damage and are a threat to our safety.
Meet a Hurricane
Learn what makes a hurricane a hurricane, as well as how these storms can cause damage from storm surge, heavy rain, and fierce winds.
Making Clouds
Clouds are made of water or ice crystals, but how do they form? Learn more about cloud formation and when it’s likely to happen
Is it Going to Snow?
Why is it so hard to predict when we’ll have a snow day? Find out what factors determine whether precipitation will fall as rain, sleet, or snow!
How Hail is Made in Storms
How do hailstones form, and why are some much larger than others? Watch to learn how hail can form during a thunderstorm.
Hazardous Heat Waves
Heat waves are abnormally hot weather that occurs over a few days to several weeks, and climate change is making them worse. Watch and find out why heat waves are a hazard and what you can do to stay safe when they happen.
All About Blizzards
A blizzard isn’t just any old snowstorm. It’s extreme winter weather. Watch and learn what makes these storms special.
All About the Atmosphere
The atmosphere has multiple layers, each with unique traits. Travel along and discover each of these layers surrounding our planet.
Predicting the Weather
Meet a supercomputer and learn how these groups of computers work together to make models that predict the weather.
How Rainbows Form
See a rainbow in the sky? Most likely you’ve noticed the order of the colors. But how do rainbows form? Find out how.
The Why of Wildfires
Wildfires are a natural part of nature. But they can quickly become dangerous. Learn tips on how to keep safe from wildfire.
How the Sun Warms the Earth
Our planet would be very cold if we didn't have the Sun. Find out how the Sun heats the Earth from the ground up.
The Making of a Microburst
Microbursts are special types of storms. They last only a few minutes, but they’re very powerful storms you’ll want to know more about.
Classroom Activities
Make Lightning
Make static electricity to see how lightning works.
Cloud In a Jar
Clouds are made of water. Use common items from around the house to make a simple model of a cloud in jar.
IOOS K-12 Toolkit
Cool Playgrounds
Outdoors on a sunny, warm day, students explore how areas in the shade and light colors remain a bit cooler than areas in the sunshine and dark colors. Then they apply what they’ve learned to design a shade structure that will keep a playground cooler during hot summer days.
Shrinking Ice
Students explore glaciers and other parts of the Earth system through photos from Alaska and identify how the environment changed in photos taken over the 20th century as the climate warmed.
The Disappearing Pond
Students learn how making changes to our environment can help keep people safe and reduce the impacts of weather hazards as they explore a human-built pond that is sometimes dry and sometimes filled with floodwater.
Colors of Snow
Students learn that snow can be various shades but is usually light in color, which reflects most of the sunlight that hits it, unlike darker materials.
Snowflake Shapes
Learn how snowflakes form and about their unique patterns, and then use images of real snowflakes to create your own snowflake model.
Winter Weather Teaching Box
Winter weather may cancel school, but it’s also an opportunity to learn science. This teaching box is filled with hands-on activities that get primary grade students to learn the science of winter weather including concepts of earth science. Explore the educational resources in this teaching box and bring snow and ice into your classroom!
Keeping Warm
Students learn how people and wildlife keep warm during cold winter weather.
Clouds Teaching Box
Clouds are both universal and mysterious. The science of clouds helps students feel closer to the sky and in awe of nature as they learn elementary concepts of physics, the water cycle, and atmospheric science. Explore the educational resources in this teaching box and bring cloud science to your elementary students.
Cloud Trivia Game
Make a fortune-teller style hand-held game to test your cloud knowledge.
Using Satellites to Learn About Animals
A collection of educational activities (and a comic book!) about using satellites to track hard-to-study animals from space.
Sunshine and Shadows
Students explore how shadows work and why they change through the day as the Sun appears to move across the sky by comparing their shadows at different times of the day and modeling with shadow puppets to see how the location of a light source changes a shadow.
Explore How Cars Lose Control on Ice, Safely
Build a model of an icy road to explore winter driving conditions and develop your own slippery experiments.
Elementary GLOBE
Introduces students in grades K-4 to the study of Earth system science through storybooks and hands-on learning activities.
CMMAP
Created educational simulations, activities, and articles about clouds and climate for K-12 teachers and students.
Planet Magnet
Students use iron filings to explore the magnetic field around a magnet and record their observations. Next, students apply their experience with the magnet to understand the magnetic field around Earth. Following their investigation, students summarize their findings.
Rain Measurements Tell a Story
Using language arts, math, and measurement skills, elementary students explore rainfall data and learn how to measure precipitation through an interactive story.
Climate Postcards
Elementary students learn about the climate zones of the world by interpreting graphs and identifying climate zones described in postcards.
Infusing Science with the Arts
Explore STEAM education resources such as stories, online galleries, and activities to bridge art and science in your classroom.
Modeling a Weather Front
In this activity, students observe how temperature changes can create a weather front, in particular how the mixing of warm and cold air can produce thunderstorms. Water, which behaves very similarly to air, and a density tank are used in this demonstration.
Modeling the Behavior of Air with Bottles
In this hands-on activity, students explore how temperature affects the behavior of air molecules.
Photon Folks
Students learn that when light shines on an object, it is reflected, absorbed, or transmitted through the object, depending on the object’s material and frequency (color) of the light.
Thermal Expansion of Water
Students investigate how thermal expansion of seawater impacts sea level.
Blue Skies and Red Sunsets
Find out how some wavelengths of light are scattered more than others producing blue skies and red sunsets.
Up and Away - Bernoulli's Way
Learn about Bernoulli's Principle with hairdryers and ping pong balls!
Plunger Pull
Use plungers to create a vacuum and learn about how air exerts pressure.
Not Your Usual Pop!
Students learn how to crush a can with only air pressure.
Clouds in the Air: Why Are They There?
An experiment that demonstrates why there are clouds in the sky. Start with air, invisible water vapor, particles we call condensation nuclei, and air pressure...the cloud comes later!
Balloon in a Bottle
Air takes up space. It's only when air in the bottle escapes that more air is easily added!
Drawing Clouds Inside the Lines
In this classroom activity, students investigate how clouds change over time by making repeat observations of a section of sky and then representing their data graphically.
Create a Portable Cloud
In this hands-on activity, students experiment to discover how moisture, pressure, temperature, and condensation nuclei play a role in cloud formation.
The Art of Clouds
Students use a cloud identification guide to identify clouds in landscape paintings, then make their own art to identify cloud types.
Catching Snowflakes
Are you in a place where snow falls in winter? If so, try catching snowflakes. Then take a close look. Can you find two snowflakes that look alike?