Where water is found on Earth
Identify water in oceans, rivers, lakes, glaciers, underground and the air, and recognise liquid water, solid ice and gaseous water vapour
What a learner can do afterwards
- List where water is found on Earth: oceans, rivers, lakes, glaciers, underground, atmosphere
- Explain that water exists as liquid (rivers, oceans) and solid (ice, glaciers, snow)
- Recognise that most of Earth's water is in the oceans
1 · Read
Rivers, lakes, oceans and glaciers are surface water stores. Groundwater is water stored in spaces in soil and rock below ground. The air contains water too. Water vapour is invisible water in gas form. Clouds contain tiny liquid drops, ice crystals or both. These stores can be grouped by location: in the air, on the surface or below ground.
Ice and snow are solid water. Cooling liquid water enough makes it freeze. Warming ice can make it melt. A glacier is a large mass of ice that moves slowly. It forms as snow builds up and is pressed into ice. A piece of glacier ice that breaks into the sea is an iceberg.
Most of Earth's water is salty ocean water. Ice, groundwater, rivers, lakes and air hold much less altogether. Underground water may be hidden. Ice can be visible. Whether you can see water does not tell you whether it is solid or liquid.
Water is found in oceans, rivers, lakes, ice, underground and air. Most is ocean water. Ice is solid water; vapour is gas.
All three readings written for this dataset.
More to read
Water beyond the ocean
Oceans hold most of Earth's water. Other water stays in rivers, lakes, ice and spaces underground.
There is water in the air too. Invisible water vapour is gas. Cloud droplets are liquid, and cloud ice crystals are solid. Water does not have to look like a river to count as water.
Two ways to find floating ice
Sea water can freeze at the ocean surface. This makes sea ice.
An iceberg has a different history. It breaks from ice that formed on land, such as a glacier, and enters the sea. Both sea ice and icebergs are solid water, but they did not form in the same place or way.
Fresh water is not always drinking water
Fresh water contains much less salt than ocean water. Many rivers and lakes hold fresh water, though some lakes are salty.
Fresh water may still contain germs or harmful material. Do not drink directly from a river or lake. Drinking water needs to come from a safe supply.
2 · Watch
Take it off screen
Where it sits
Where this leads
Jobs that lean on this skill. Follow one to see everything it is built on.
8 questions wait behind this lesson, each with its answer explained. Every answer feeds the sky: stars light as they are learned, and dim when it is time to come back.