All 16 Cloud Types & What They Mean flashcards. Free.
The whole deck, not a sample — Cloud Types & What They Mean is 16 cards, which is no longer than the 30 we give away on every deck, so there is nothing left to charge for. 9 pages, US Letter, black and white. Grades 5–12.
No account, no email, no card details.
9 pages, and the backs are already right
Every front sheet is followed by its own back sheet with the rows reversed. Print double-sided, flip on the long edge, and answer number 7 is behind question number 7. Print a deck you built yourself, flip on the short edge, and every answer lands on the wrong card — which nobody finds out until sixty cards have been cut apart.
- 16 cards — counted out of the file, not rounded up
- Eight cards a sheet, with cut guides
- US Letter PDF, black and white, photocopier-friendly
- Print a set per student, every class, every year
16 cards. The WMO recognises exactly ten cloud genera — that is the whole top level of the classification, not a selection. The other six cards are the three height levels, the genera that cross them, the genus/species/variety distinction and the Latin roots.
Every card here is cited to two independent sources
Two different organisations — not a standards body and a website reprinting it — and a script refuses the card if the two disagree, so the check runs on every card rather than on the ones somebody remembered to look at. A second specialist then re-verified this deck from sources of their own, without reading our citations first. A further 5,420 cards across 30 other decks were read end to end by a subject specialist instead, and we say which is which on every deck rather than averaging the two into one flattering word.
What 16 printed cards do that a screen does not
A phone deck is one card at a time. A printed deck is a pile you can split: the ones you know, the ones you nearly know, and the ones you keep missing. That third pile is the entire study session, and it is the thing a scrolling app hides from you.
- Print once, use all year. The licence covers a set per student, every class, every year.
- No device, no login, no data. Works in a cover lesson, on a bus, or at a kitchen table. Grades 5–12, filed under science.
- Change what you disagree with. Every card loads into the free maker on this site. Reword it, drop it, add your own, reprint.
Here are all 16 cards
Check them against your own textbook before you spend anything.
- Cirrus (Ci)
- High level — detached white filaments, patches or narrow bands, fibrous like hair or with a silky sheen
- Cirrocumulus (Cc)
- High level — thin white patch or layer of very small grains or ripples, with no shading; elements under 1° wide
- Cirrostratus (Cs)
- High level — transparent whitish veil, fibrous or smooth, that often produces halo phenomena
- Altocumulus (Ac)
- Middle level — white or grey patches, rolls or rounded masses, generally with shading; elements 1°–5° wide
- Altostratus (As)
- Middle level — grey or bluish sheet; thin parts show the Sun as through frosted glass, and it shows no halo
- Nimbostratus (Ns)
- Middle level for the WMO, though it usually spreads into the other two — grey layer of rain or snow, Sun blotted out
- Stratocumulus (Sc)
- Low level — grey or whitish rolls or rounded masses, almost always with dark parts; elements over 5° wide
- Stratus (St)
- Low level — grey layer with a fairly uniform base; may give drizzle, snow or snow grains; halo only in extreme cold
- Cumulus (Cu)
- Low base — detached, sharp-edged heaps with cauliflower tops, brilliant white in sun, dark flattish bases
- Cumulonimbus (Cb)
- Low base, great vertical extent — a mountain or tower of cloud, top often flattened into an anvil; thunderstorms
- The high level (cirro-)
- Cirrus, Cirrocumulus, Cirrostratus — bases about 5–13 km in temperate latitudes; 3–8 polar, 6–18 tropical
- The middle level (alto-)
- Altocumulus, Altostratus, Nimbostratus — bases about 2–7 km in temperate latitudes; 2–4 polar, 2–8 tropical
- The low level
- Stratus, Stratocumulus, Cumulus, Cumulonimbus — bases from the Earth's surface up to 2 km at every latitude
- Which genera break out of their level?
- Nimbostratus usually reaches into both others; Altostratus often extends higher; Cumulus and Cb tops can too
- Genus, species, variety — which does this deck teach?
- The genera: the ten top-level WMO types. Species describe shape and structure, varieties arrangement and transparency
- What do cirro-, alto-, strato-, cumulo- and nimbo- mean?
- Latin: cirrus a lock of hair, altum height, stratus spread in a layer, cumulus a heap, nimbus a rainy cloud
Questions
- How do I print them double-sided?
- Double-sided, flip on the long edge. Every front sheet is followed by its own already-mirrored back sheet, so print them in the order they come and every answer lands on its own card.
- Can I edit the cards?
- Yes, and that is half the point. Once you own the deck, the "Buy & edit" button here opens all 16 cards in the free flash card maker on this site — reword a definition, delete the ones you do not teach, add your own, and print at anything from two to nine cards a page, rather than the fixed eight of the PDF.
- Can I print a set for every student?
- Yes. Personal and classroom licence: unlimited printing, every class you teach, every year you teach it. It does not cover reselling the file or passing it on to a colleague.
- What if I find a card that is wrong?
- Tell us and we fix it, and we publish what changed. We have withdrawn a whole deck from sale for being out of date rather than quietly patch it.
- Do I need an account?
- No. The file downloads straight away — no account, no email, no card details.