Friday 24 January 2014

Water, Water Everywhere


It is still raining quite a bit where we are.  We have been measuring the daily rainfall using our homemade rain gauge.


The amount of rainfall that we get is nothing compared to some parts of the country.  It started with heavy rainfall in December, building up to floods occuring in many parts of the country by early January.  We have been looking at the photographs here, here, and here to see the damage and inconveniences caused by having too much water.


To get to the bottom of things, we decided to find out what might have caused the extreme weather, specifically the factors that might have led to flooding:


Naturally, being near a river is going to be a concern at a time like this.  However, river flooding doesn't necessarily have to become hazardous, if proper planning and management have been done to make use of the sediments deposited by the flood water, as we have learnt two years ago in world history -- where the flooding of the River Nile was a major source of the fertiility of the lands around it.  Below are some phots of the experiment we did to illustrate the flooding of the Nile leading to fertile land.  We used planted grass seeds in an aluminium tray, flooded the "river", and waited for a week for all the water to be absorbed and the grass to grow.


The Thames is a tidal river, hence very susceptible to flooding.  Having London flooded would be extremely costly, hence the Thames Barrier has been very much in use these few weeks to make sure that doesn't happen:


Apart from rivers being a potential source of flooding, coastal flooding can be lethal too:


The force of water can be illustrated by making a simple water wheel using plastic cups and paper plates.  It works but isn't very robust, being made out of paper plates and all, so the rain made it very soggy after a few hours.  Nonetheless, it served its purpose before it disintegrated.


It seems that the trouble is going to persist for a while yet...


For anyone who is living in a high flood-risk area, it's probably a very good idea to learn from here all about how to prepare for a potential flood, what to do during and after a flood, and how to manage flood risks.  Alternatively, much can be learned from books too.




This post is linked up to:
  1. Geography and History Meme: Ancient Egypt activities for kids
  2. Entertaining and Educational - Hasty Pudding
  3. Collage Friday: The Key to Successful Homeschool
  4. Weekly Wrap-up: The One with the Love Languages, Too Much Castle, and New Curriculum
  5. Homeschool Mother's Journal {January 25, 2014}
  6. Science Sunday: What Do Your Students Need to Know Before High School - Biology
  7. Hip Homeschool Hop - 1/28/2014

13 comments:

  1. Goodness, you've been so busy with all this weather. Tell Tiger he could now qualify as a weather man on BBC!!
    I actually can't believe how much wonderful learning you have managed to squeeze out of water! Well done, Hwee!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Claire! :-) The wet weather has kept us indoors most of the time, so I try to make the most of the situation by finding things to entertain ourselves. :-)

      Delete
  2. And not a drop to drink? :-) I am very much enjoying these posts of how you are linking Tiger's work in science to better understanding the world around him. Thank you!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're welcome, Dana! :-) Thanks for stopping by. I wouldn't risk drink unfiltered water these days, to be honest. :-)

      Delete
  3. Those look like great books. My son is always interested in natural disasters, but we haven't checked out books on floods. It's a great idea. Thanks so much.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're very welcome, Julie. The topic seems to have fallen into our laps so we just checked out a few related books from the library. I hope your son enjoys learning about natural disasters too. It's been a fascinating study.

      Delete
  4. I agree with Claire - this is absolutely brilliant! I've so been enjoying learning about the weather here with you recently, plus being inspired by the spontaneous hands-on learning opportunities you've been finding!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Lucinda. :-) "Spontaneous hands-on learning opportunities" is a really complimentary way to describe "making it up on the spot". :-) I'm getting really good at it nowadays.

      Delete
  5. Loving the water wheel! Love how you DIVE in (no pun intended) to each subject. Enjoy the weekend.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Melissa. :-) You have a good weekend too!

      Delete
  6. What a great study! I love all the things you have made -especially the river model. A weatherman in the making.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Phyllis. I'm not sure that he is a weatherman in the making but it's nice to know that he has some awareness of what's going on with the weather around him. :-)

      Delete
  7. Hmph, another post I thought I'd commented on, but apparently hadn't.

    We tried making a water wheel once, and it broke because ours was not constructed out of sturdy enough materials.

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...