What happens in each step of the water cycle? In this lesson we explored the four steps of the water cycle; evaporation, condensation, precipitation, and collection. Water, being one of the most important elements on our planet, has a very specific way of traveling throughout our Earth. It takes its time to travel from the sea, to the sky, to land, and right back to the sea, changing states of matter. One of the results of this cycle is precipitation, such as rain, which comes from the creation of clouds during condensation. In our activity we created our own rain clouds using paper plates, cotton balls, string, and blue paper. While our artists were at work we talked about our favorite activities to do on rainy days and other kinds of precipitation such as snow and hail.