Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs Nature Book Club ~ A Stormy Party School

Meatballs, rain experiments, and a tomato tornado inspired the kids to learn about the weather at our Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs nature book club.

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs Book Club Discussion

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs Book Club Snacks

I found a toy schoolhouse and made a pancake for the roof, like in the book. Sadly, my pancake broke before I could get a picture. I guess pancakes aren't really roof material. We also added a jello sunset though ours wasn't as tall and didn't glow with the setting sun.

One of the moms in our book club made some cloud cupcakes with blue icing and marshmallow clouds.

I made a Tomato Tornado cake and wrapped it in fondant spaghetti and meatballs. Personally, I just loved saying Tomato Tornado, but the kids loved that it was made of chocolate and not actually tomatoes.

And of course, we had to have meatballs because there is always a "chance of meatballs."

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs Book Club Activities

For this month's nature book club, we decided to focus on clouds and rainy weather. We started with clear jars of water that we added clouds to (aka shaving cream). Then we added drops of blue food coloring to simulate the rain. 

The students were fascinated as they watched the food coloring slowly slip through the clouds and drip like rain.

Then we made rain bags for the kids to take home. These were plastic bags filled with colored water. We drew a sun and clouds on the top. The children carried them home and hung them on a window. As the bags heated up, they produced condensation, which acted like rain clouds. Eventually, the droplets dripped down the bag and simulated rain.

This was such a great way to inspire the kids to learn about weather, even crazy weather like raining meatballs.

What ways have you inspired your children to learn about nature?