Weather School / First Weather · ages 2 to 5

The weather rock watching a ribbon on a stick stream sideways in the wind, with leaves flying past in the very same direction.

Which Way Is the Wind Going?

The wind is always going somewhere. Which way is it headed today?

The weather rock outside under a windy sky, waiting to be looked at.

The mission: guess first, then go look

Before you go out, guess which way the wind will push you: toward the house or away from it. Point your whole arm the way you think it is going.

Now stand outside and let the wind find you. Watch a flag, a tree, or somebody's hair. Everything leans the same way, because the wind only travels one road at a time.

You already know the wind pushes things. Here is its secret: it pushes them all the same way.

The wind comes in from one side of the sky and heads out the other.

Flags, smoke, and leaning trees will all point out the answer, if you watch.

Professor Weather Rock in a graduation cap, pointing upward with a wooden pointer.

Professor Weather Rock says

Grown-ups name a wind for where it came from, so a north wind blows from the north, headed south. The wind never gets a say in what it is called.

Rocktivity Time!

Pick a door. Every door is a good one.

Move like the weather

Be a weather vane. Stand tall with one arm out straight, and when your grown-up whooshes past like the wind, swing slowly around to point the way they went. When the wind turns, the vane turns. That is its whole career.

Ask them

“If you could ride the wind today, where do you think it would take you?”

The Rocktivity

Put a little ball of paper on the table and be the wind: blow it over to your grown-up. Now they blow it back. The paper goes wherever the wind sends it. It does not get a vote.

When the wind is blowing, try this

Tie a ribbon or a strip of paper to a stick. Before you raise it, point which way you think it will fly. Now hold the stick up high and see. After lunch, take it out and guess again first. Did the wind change its mind while you were eating?

Is the rock right?

You looked with your own eyes. The rock is outside looking too. Ask it what it sees, then decide together who read the sky better.

Words we learned

Directionnounsay it: dih-REK-shunThe way something is going.

Breezenounsay it: BREEZA small, gentle wind, the friendly kind.

For the grown-up

Wind direction is real forecasting data. Meteorologists name a wind for where it comes from, and a change in direction often means the weather itself is about to change. The after-lunch ribbon check is the same observation a weather vane makes for a living, and a child who notices the wind shifted has genuinely caught the atmosphere at work. Wherever they say the wind would carry them, ask what they would see below on the way.

Take it off the screen

A colouring sheet with the big word to trace, plus the whole lesson in print. Free for any home or classroom.

Print the colouring sheet and lesson (PDF)

The trail continues

The wind does not only work down here. Look up: the clouds are riding it too. Watch which way they sail, and guess whether it matches the way your ribbon pointed.

Then go meet the riders themselves at Cloudy Days.