Jeff Lukas with Western Water Assessment discusses how the climate of the Western United States affects the availability of water resources. Learn more about the natural processes that drive our water cycle in the Western United States. This video is part of the Water in the Western US lecture series.

In this video Dr. Anne Gold and Eric Gordon give a brief review on the different processes involved in the water cycle, specifically in the Western United States.

See the relative volume of water available that is clean, safe, and available to drink.

A computer simulator that allows students to adjust the air temperature and dew point to see what type of precipitation would fall to the ground.

Students observe the process of evaporation, make comparisons about the process, then construct a diagram and use it to describe the process of evaporation. This activity takes four 30 minute class periods. Additional materials are required.

In this activity, students act as water molecules and travel through parts of the water cycle (ocean, atmosphere, clouds, glaciers, snow, rivers, lakes, ground, aquifer). Students use a diagram of the hydrologic cycle to draw the pathway they traveled. Activity takes about 1 class period.

This lesson is an instructor demonstration that focuses specifically on two aspects of the water cycle: evaporation and condensation. This is a well described instructor led demonstration for introducing and exploring the water cycle. This activity takes approximately 1 hour 35 minutes, but can be broken into separate lessons. Additional…

In this lesson, students will learn about the water cycle and how energy from the sun and the force of gravity drive this cycle. This learning activity takes at least two 45 minute class periods.

This NASA video provides a nice overview of Earth's water cycle from the perspective of looking at Earth from space. Video length is 5:52 min.

This is a short NASA video on the water cycle. The video shows the importance of the water cycle to nearly every natural process on Earth and illustrates how tightly coupled the water cycle is to climate. Video length: 6:31

This classroom demonstration illustrates the amount of water stored in various parts of the Earth system in a straightforward manner. Students estimate the proportions of water in the oceans, icecaps and glaciers, groundwater, freshwater lakes, inland seas, soil moisture, atmosphere, and rivers. Then they fill beakers with the actual proportion…

This activity was developed to give participants an understanding of Earth's water cycle by completing a WebQuest and building a model of the water cycle. This activity takes 1 hour.

This visualization, from the US Geological Survey, provides a simple schematic of the various pathways that water can take as it cycles through ocean, lakes, atmosphere, surface and ground.

  Students learn about the water cycle and hydrology through a series of three lessons, two coloring book pages, and an e-Book. The themes covered in this resource tie into Climate Science and fundamental climate principles, as well as, engages students in scientific methods. This series of activities takes a minimum of six 30-45 mins class…