How to Make a Raincloud in a Jar
With a foam cloud, blue rain and a jar you can discover how rain is formed.
This activity is also a good one to try with your younger siblings.
You will need adult supervision- this could get messy! .
What you need:
Shaving foam (FOAM not gel)
A jar or tall clear container
Food colouring (blue)
Water
Pipette/Dropper (optional)
What to do:
Fill your jar almost to the top with water
Squirt some shaving foam on top to create your big fluffy cloud
Carefully drip food colouring onto the cloud, you could use a dropper
Watch what happens and then add a few more drops, continue this until your blue rain falls from the bottom of your cloud
What Can I See?
This is a very simple model of a raincloud. When the cloud can no longer hold the weight of the blue food colouring you will see blue drops fall downwards like rain.
It is similar with rain. Clouds are made up of tiny water droplets and when enough of these come together they become too heavy to stay in the sky and gravity will pull them down to earth as rain.
Experiment with your cloud
Continue to experiment and think about the different types of weather you can replicate in a jar. Can you make it snow? Or cause a hurricane?
You could try spraying water on top of your blue cloud. When I did this it caused paler blobby raindrops to fall. It looked a bit more like snow than rain.
What different types of weather can you create?
We would love to see a photo of your experiment!