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Clouds: iBook and Activity

Use this accessible iBook to introduce students to different types of clouds.

Editor’s Note: iBook is now Apple Books.

Learning about cloud types is a common elementary school activity. Students with visual impairments and blindness may or may not be able to visually identify cloud types in the sky; however, students are aware of the weather and can associate the different cloud types with the weather. Begin the lesson by discussing today’s weather and comparing it to yesterday’s weather. What kind of effect do you think the clouds have on the weather?

Clouds iBook

Use the accessible Clouds iBook to introduce the four types of clouds:

*’Nimbus’ in front of a cloud means a cloud that produces precipitation. (Nimbostratus: dark clouds that are seen when rain or snow is happening all day long.)

Discuss the different characteristics of the clouds. Be sure to point out the height (elevation) texture and color of the clouds.

Create a Cloudscape Activity

Provide construction paper/braille paper, cotton balls, glue and crayons/chalk for each student. Have each student write/braille one cloud name on each page. Using the provided materials, each student creates a cloud that depicts the named cloud’s characteristics. Dark chalk can be substituted for the crayon as it provides more tactile feedback.

You must have the free iBooks app installed on your iOS device or Mac. Then, download the free Clouds iBook here and select ‘Open in iBooks’.

Lindsey’s Tactile Cloud Book

Lindsey Lanier, a freshman at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, created the Clouds iBook as a class project. She also created a tactile version of her book, as an example for others. Her tactile book has the sentences in braille at the top of each page. She added a blue sheet of paper below the braille (provides better contrast between the page and the cotton balls) and used cotton balls, glue and crayons to represent the various types of clouds. See the photos of each page below.

Photo of Cloud Title page with the brailled text 'Clouds' and cotton balls representing the clouds.

Photo of page 1 Clouds book with braille text and 5 white, fluffy cotton balls.

Photo of page 2 Clouds book with braille text and 3 whispy stretched-out pieces of cotton.

photo of page 3 Clouds book with braille and 3-darkly colored cotton balls in a row, low on the page.

photo of page 4 Clouds book with braille and 10 darkly colored cotton balls stacked on top of each other and 5 textured rain drops below.

How Do Clouds Form?

Education World shares a hands-on experiment which illustrates how clouds form.

Materials Needed

Instructions for cloud experiment here.

Note: When presenting a class experiment, allow the student with a visual impairment to physically explore each material used in the experiment (as appropriate). Describe each step and each reaction. Guide student discussion about what is happening. If appropriate, actively involve the student in the experiment itself. A student with low vision should be given preferred seating; if the experiment can be done under a document camera, use a screen sharing app like Join.Me so that the student can view (and zoom) the experiment on his/her own device.

Collage for Clouds iBook and Activity

Attached File(s)

https://www.perkins.org/sites/elearning.perkinsdev1.org/files/Clouds.ibooks
By Diane Brauner

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