Homemade Weather Vane and Compass Activity

There’s been a lot of weather in my life recently. We just had a couple weeks of awesome summer weather followed by some sleet, snow, and hail. (Unfortunately, I wasn’t paying much attention to the changes in weather and my 4 year old dressed herself in shorts and flip flops during one of our outings where it started to hail.) I’ve also been helping out with my 6 year old’s homeschool co-op where the kids are learning about weather. I’ve been assigned the precipitation group and think it’s awesome that my toddler can now yell “PRECIP-TATION!” when it rains. My son is in the wind group where he’s made a wind sock and measured the direction of the wind, recording his data each week and using those records to make predictions.

Recently, I was flipping through my son’s Waldorf first grade curriculum book and saw this weather vane project. It fit so perfectly with what my son was already studying that I decided to make one and feature it as my science contribution on 123Homeschool4Me this month. To make it a little more educational, we also made our own homemade compass to orient our weather vane. (See the 123Homeschool4Me post for detailed picture instructions for both activities.)

If you’re looking for a great, fun book to go along with your weather studies, particularly for younger kids, I highly recommend Freddy the Frogcaster. My 6 year old stumbled across this picture book at the library and he and my 4 year old really enjoyed it. (Apparently there are other books in the series featuring blizzards, tornadoes, and hurricanes. I need to remember to add them to my library hold list.) If you’re interested in a slightly less educational, but extremely fun book about weather, be sure to incorporate Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs into your weather lessons. While it obviously doesn’t feature REAL weather, it is impressive how many weather-related terms and expressions have been fit into this book in the context of food.

Don’t forget, head on over to 123Homeschool4Me to find a full picture tutorial for making your own homemade weathervane and compass and have fun encouraging your budding meteorologists!

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