The trick to understanding what a decimal is, is to think of pennies and dimes.

0.10 is a tenth of a dollar.  Ten dimes equal a dollar.

0.01 is a hundredth of a dollar.  A hundred pennies equal a dollar.

Do you know how much money 8 tenths is equal to?

Precipitation is wet weather.  It's part of the water cycle.  There are 4 main types of precipitation, although you can also get a "wintery mix" of a couple types together.

All precipitation comes from clouds, and it's freezing way up there in the clouds, even in the summer time!  However the temperature near the ground can cause the freezing precipitation to melt, if it's warm enough.  Hail is able to form in the summer because the clouds are freezing, and wind can cause the precipitation to build up in the clouds so much that it doesn't have time to melt before it hits the ground.

Here is what a large hailstone looks like!  They're not all that big.  But on this one you can see all the layers where it got wet, blown back up into the cloud where it was freezing, and that repeated over and over before falling to the ground. 

Have you ever seen hail before?  Answer in the comments below.   

Today we learned how the Great Lakes can connect, even though one is much lower than the others!

Since I've been to Foxton Locks in England, I thought I could explain it best by showing you a video of how those locks work.  They're smaller than the system used for the Great Lakes, but they're just as ingenious.

As you watch the video below (it's about 7 minutes long, and you don't need sound), see if you can identify the:

• Reservoir
  
• Crank
  
• Lock
  
• Door
  

Here is an explanation of the water cycle. Click on this for the whole class to watch, or else use headphones to watch it:  Water Cycle Video.

You can see an animated diagram of the water cycle here.  There is no sound, but you can take your time reading the labeled parts and watching the arrows move.  Look at the words on the right of the pictures.  You can click each of these 3 words to learn where the water vapor goes, what each part of the process is called, and arrows showing the direction water takes.

You have all worked very hard in math this year.  This is YOUR opportunity to show off how much you learned. 

Take your time, read carefully, and check over your work before you hand in your test.  Stick with it, and show your work.  I know you'll do great!

Do you like getting packages in the mail?  Have you ever thought about people's jobs in the post office?  This is a simple game that lets YOU feel like you're working in a post office.

To play this post office measurement game, you need to read a ruler, scale, and table.  You might need a pencil and paper, unless you can remember two different numbers for a couple minutes.  Also, the measurements are metric, which means:

Lengths are in centimeters
Weights are in grams and kilograms