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Calendar of Events

May 2006
Clouds

"Clouds come floating into my life,
no longer to carry rain or usher storm,
but to add color to my sunset sky."
Rabindranath Tagore

What to Do This Month:
Visit Madison Children's Museum's Science Symposium (May 10th).

Take a walk in the rain - float a stick down the storm run-off.

Take time to watch the clouds.

Check out family events at area Nature Net sites!

Tricks of the Trail for Parents:
It's Raining, It's Pouring...
Best to be prepared for unexpected downpours and showers.  Small tote umbrellas in your backpack are nice, but rain ponchos allow a wider range of movement for rain-time exploration in the outdoors.  Affordable ponchos for children are available at discount stores, and if you have a rain hat available emergency ponchos can be fashioned by cutting a neck hole in the bottom of a can liner. 

Instant Outdoor Expert:
Know Your Clouds
Cumulonimbus, stratocumulus, cirrostratus... names of clouds can be daunting and confusing.  But demystifying cloud names and types can be achieved by learning just a few categories and key words.
All clouds are named first based on three basic shapes.  1) The classic puffy billows of cotton balls in the sky, named for the Latin word "heaps", are called Cumulus.  2) The word cirrus means "curl" and Cirrus clouds appear as whisps in the sky. 3) Sheets or uniform, flat layers of clouds are named Status from the Latin word for "layer".  One more word to know: Nimbus (or nimbo) can be added to the name of any cloud that produces precipitation.
Next clouds are named for the altitude or height where they are found. Again Latin terms are used but here's where the confusion can set in - some of the words are the same or similar to those used to describe shape. For example, low laying clouds (from Earth's surface to about 2,000 meters above) get the prefix or suffix "strato".  So, stratocumulus are low, puffy clouds; and nimbostratus are low-laying raining or snowing clouds.  Higher clouds (2,000-7,000 meters above Earth) are described with the prefix "alto" - as in altostratus which are mid-height, sheet-like clouds. And the highest clouds (5,000-13,000 meters) are pre-fixed with "cirro" like the high, cottony cirrocumulus.  
And we could not discuss clouds without mentioning the famous thunderstorm cloud:  cumulonimbus - which you now can interpret to mean "heaps with precipitation". There are, of course, certain aerial phenomena that receive special designation  but the information here will certainly get you started naming and gazing at the clouds.
For more details about clouds and identification tips, visit NASA's S'COOL video (you'll want your computer's sound on).  Or, view great pictures at Scienceclass.com

Eco-Exercise:
Water Cycle Relay
To bring home the idea of where clouds come from and where the water they're made of ends up, play a rousing round of "Water Cycle Relay" with some friends.
To start, fill four large containers (wash tubs or buckets) with water and into each, drop a small plastic cup.  Now create equal teams lined up behind each bucket and assign roles: clouds, plants, lake, stream.  Have each team think about where they could go.  The Cloud Team, for example, could rain into a lake or stream or be soaked up by plants; and the Stream Team could flow into the lake, be soaked up by plants or evaporate into a cloud.  Think of as many possibilities as you can. 
Now, the first person in each team can fill their cup from the bucket and get ready to dump it's contents into another team's bucket. On the word "go" all teams scoop, dump then pass their cup to the next person on their team. Let the fun and splashing continue for as long as you like, then call "stop" and investigate who the "winner" is.  You should find out, as in real life, there is no official "winner" because water is continually cycling!

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Madison Children's Museum
Explore a world of adventure through unique experiences at the Madison Children's Museum
Plan a trip to State Street, Madison's premier shopping and arts district, and discover Wisconsin's first hands-on Museum for children! Madison Children's Museum is a not-for-profit museum featuring hands-on exhibits and stimulating programs, particularly for children birth through age eight.
Check out your teeth and bones in the new Body Shop; take a wild ride on the Dream Machine; play with your baby or toddler in First Feats; dig into dinosaurs; capture your shadow; and plant vegetables in our garden.
All of our exhibits are designed with the planning and assistance of professional advisors on the topics of each exhibit, along with local artists and kids. In 1998, Madison Children's Museum committed to designing and building healthy exhibits for kids and families by creating a chemical free environment using all natural and sustainable materials, the first of its kind. Since then, Children's Museums across the country have turned to us as the national expert in "green exhibit design."
Museum Hours:
Sunday noon-5:00
Monday 1:00-6:00
Tuesday-Friday 9:00-4:00
Saturday 9:00-5:00

Admission rates: $4 per person for adults and kids, children under 1 are free, $3 per person for seniors. Free admission the first Sunday of every month!

Make a Rain Gauge
Keeping track of rainfall is an interactive way for kids to follow outdoor happenings and get a sense of how much rain falls in a rainstorm, a week, a month or even a year.  Keep track long enough and you can compare from year to year - find out if 2006 is a relatively dry or wet year.  Here's how to make a simple rain gauge from recycled materials:

Start with a 2-liter soda bottle (with straight sides) and cut off the top about four inches down.  Place stones or gravel in the bottom of the bottle up to where the sides are straight. (This will add weigh to the gauge and make it more stable.)  Next, tape a ruler to the side to the bottle with the zero mark about a half-inch above the gravel.  (If you cannot spare your ruler, once it's taped on, mark the bottle with a permanent marker every half-inch and remove it.) Pour enough water into the bottle to fill it to the zero mark on the ruler.  Now, invert the top of the bottle (the portion you cut off earlier) and put it into the bottom portion so it looks like a funnel.  Now, you're ready to collect some rain.
Place the gauge in an open area away from trees or buildings, which may affect the amount of rain that falls into the bottle. Wait for a rainstorm and afterward, to read your gauge, note the number on your ruler closest to the level of the liquid.

(Adapted from Canada's weatheroffice.com)

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