Elementary student understanding the concept of cycling of water in and out of

the atmosphere serves as a prerequisite to learning about climatic patterns

during middle school years. Therefore, it is important that students have a firm
grasp of these concepts and clarify common misconceptions. The national
standards documents provide insight into understanding what elementary
students may think about the water cycle prior to instruction:
Students a familiar with the change of state between water and ice, but
the idea of liquids having a set of properties is more nebulous and requires more
instructional generalization that may substances can be exist as either a liquid or
a solid. Students do not understand that water exists as a gas when it boils or
evaporates; they a more likely to think that water disappears or goes into the
sky. Despite that limitation, students can conduct simple investigations with
heating and evaporation that develop inquiry skills and familiarize themselves
with the phenomena.
Students idea about conservation of matter, phase change, clouds, and
rain are interrelated and contribute to understanding the water cycle. Students
seem to transit a series of stages to understand evaporation. Before they
understand that water is converted to an invisible form, they may initially believe
that when water evaporates it ceases to exist, or that it changes location but
remains a liquid, or that it is transformed into some other perceptible form.