How to Explain Lightning to a Child

Children often fear things they do not understand. Storms can be scary for children but explaining why storms occur and what makes thunder and lightening can often alleviate fears. It is also a great opportunity to teach your children something new, and make storms something to look forward to instead of something to worry about. Put aside the complicated science book and read below on how to explain lightning to a child.

Instructions

1. Explain that warm air rises in hot clouds and encounters cold air, charging the particles in the cloud making them both positive and negative and this is called static electricity. Explaining static and currents may be skipped for very small children (pre-school) as it may be too complicated and too detailed for them to handle. 'Warm air touches cold air and things begin to happen' is a good introduction for a smaller child.

2. Tell children that when enough positive and negative charges occur, they build up too much energy and explode in a flash of light that we call lightning. This flash of light helps balance out the number of negative and positive charges in the atmosphere.

3. Detail the fact that sometimes the flash of light is movement within the cloud and sometimes it is movement between the atmosphere and the ground. Simple sketches as you talk will make things much clearer for your child.

4. Impart that the movement between the atmosphere and the ground is the reason that tall objects on earth like trees are struck by lightning.

5. Describe how light travels faster than sound, and because of this, we see the flash of lighting before we hear the clap of thunder. Ensure your child understands the direct relationship of thunder and lightning so they do not see thunder as a separate phenomenon.

6. Conclude that thunder and lightning lasts only as long as is necessary to get all the electrical charges in the atmosphere back in balance.

Tips & Warnings

• Next time it storms, help your children to count the time between the flash of lightning and the sound of thunder so they can estimate how far away the storm is and whether it is getting closer or moving further away. A 5-second delay is equivalent to about one mile in distance.

• For very small children, it may be a good idea to use pots, pan, and other metallic objects to recreate the sounds of a storm in your home to help alleviate fears.

• Make a rain stick, using uncooked rice and the inner tube of a roll of paper towels, to give children a prop they can use during storms.

• Use an inflated balloon and your child's hair to illustrate static and positive and negative charges.