[Rain & Thunder] (Bailey) I'm bored. I want to play outside but it's raining. (Boggs) When will it stop raining?
(Bailey) I don't know. Why did it have to rain today? (Boggs) Good question.
(Boggs) Who do we ask for help when we have questions? (Bailey) ♫ da da da ♫ Maggie, the magnifying glass.
(Maggie) ♫ I'm Maggie, Maggie. ♫ I help to make things clear. ♫ Just look through my ♫
♫ looking glass and answers will appear. I'm Maggie, Maggie, come and let's explore ♫
♫ and we'll discover lots of things you never knew before. I'm Maggie. ♫
(Bailey) Why did it have to rain today? (Maggie) It rains just about everywhere on earth.
In some places, it rains a lot. In other places, it hardly rains at all.
Would you like to know more about rain? If so, we can go on a little adventure and explore rainstorms.
(Bailey) Would you like to learn about rainstorms?
You would? Me too! Yippee Skippy! Let's go!
(Boggs) Don't forget your journal.
(Bailey) Oh yeah! Got it! My terrific scientific journal. Bring yours along, too!
(Maggie) Ready? Let's take a look at rain.
When water droplets fall from the sky, we call it rain.
(Bailey) But why does it rain?
Well, rain happens because of the water cycle.
(Bailey) The water cycle? What's that?
(Maggie) Here's how the water cycle works.
The Sun heats a body of water, like the ocean.
The water evaporates or turns into steam or vapor and then travels up into the sky.
Then the water vapors become cooler and come together collecting in clouds.
It's called condensation.
Here is an example of condensation.
When you pour a glass of cold water
on a hot day you'll notice that water forms on the outside of the glass.
The water on the outside of the glass came from the air. Water vapor in the air
turns back into a liquid when it touches the cold glass. That's condensation!
If there is enough water in the clouds, the water will fall to the earth. We call it precipitation.
Precipitation happens when there is so much water packed together that the air can't hold it anymore
The clouds get heavy and water falls.
back to the earth as rain hail, sleet or snow.
Some of the rain will collect in the ground to begin the water cycle all over again.
(Bailey) I'm gonna write that down in my journal.
(Bailey scribbles in his journal)
(Bailey) Got it!
(Bailey) Can you tell us more about clouds? Like, do all clouds carry rain?
(Boggs) I was wondering the same thing.
(Maggie) Excellent question! Here's the answer.
A cloud is made up of very tiny droplets of water or ice crystals.
(Maggie) The droplets are so small and light that they can float in the air.
Clouds float in the Earth's atmosphere.
There are different kinds of clouds.
(Maggie) Some clouds called cumulus clouds are puffy white and appear in the sky on bright sunshiny days.
These clouds are white because they reflect the light of the Sun.
They are not rain clouds.
Then there are rain clouds.
Rain clouds are caused by the build-up of water droplets or solid ice crystals
if these clouds get very thick or high in the sky sunlight doesn't make it through.
That's why rain clouds are gray.
(Maggie) Nimbostratus clouds are the dark rain carrying clouds of bad weather.
They can be found in both summer and winter
But they are mostly seen in the winter.
These clouds cover the sky and block the Sun.
Cumulonimbus clouds produce showers and thunderstorms.
The rain comes and goes with these clouds.
(Bailey) I get it. (Bailey scribbling in journal) The water cycle causes rain and clouds are formed
by water droplets or ice crystals. Got it!
(Maggie) Rain, or the lack of rain, can really
affect the land plants people and animals, too.
(Maggie) A place that gets lots of
rain is a tropical rainforest. Because of the rain and an abundance of water, it
makes the rainforest a great place to live for lots of animals and lots of plants.
(Maggie) Rainforests are home to very strange and exotic plants and animals,
both large and small.
Some places on earth do not receive a lot of rain at all.
(Maggie) They are called deserts.
Rain evaporates in the air
before it hits the ground and dries. Because there's such little rain and a
lack of water, not many plants or animals live in the desert.
(Bailey) Can there ever be too much rain?
(Maggie) Sometimes having too much rain can cause a flood.
A flood can happen when it rains so much and so quickly that the water level in rivers
or lakes rises and then, overflows their banks. Too much rain and floods can be dangerous.
Sometimes, places don't get enough rain.
When this happens there can be a drought.
Drought is when you have less rainfall than you expected over several months or longer.
Droughts can be dangerous, too.
For farmers, drought means that you do not have enough water in the soil for crops to grow.
In a city or town people may be asked to conserve water.
Today, Meteorologists, the scientists who study weather, have tools like Doppler radar.
Doppler radar can detect a rainstorm, its size, intensity and direction.
Because of Doppler radar, forecasters can warn people of severe thunderstorms that may
bring strong damaging winds, large hail heavy rain and possibly tornadoes.
Meteorologists can also measure how much rain has fallen. They do that by using a
tool called a rain gauge. A rain gauge is a container much like a bottle that is left outside.
It fills up with rainwater and the meteorologist then measures how much rain has fallen.
(Boggs) So, we all need rain but too much or too little can be a problem.
(Maggie) Exactly! Floods or droughts are both dangerous to people, animals and plants.
(Boggs) Ahh... I get it!
(Bailey) Thanks, Maggie!
(Maggie) You're very, very welcome!
(Bailey) Today, I learned a lot about rain storms. I hope you did, too.
These are the notes I took in my journal.
(Bailey reading the notes from his journal)
(Paper rustling from turning the page)
(Bailey) Did you like learning about rain and rainstorms?
Then, let's go on another scientific adventure... real soon.
(Bailey) Bye!
(Boggs) So long!