Introduction

How to use the Teacher's Resource

This guide has been designed for use as an educational resource. Please use it in the manner that best suits your purposes: feel free to edit, adjust and photocopy all parts of this Resource. The Resource is divided into five sections, each of which roughly corresponds with the presentation areas of Children's WaterFest 2000.

• Water Science is an essential section. In this section you will find information about the chemical (and magical!) properties of water. These properties are relevant to the rest of the activities and material contained in the Resource.
  
  
• The Water Cycle contains information about the hydrologic cycle. This section is also considered essential to water resource education.
  
  
• Water For Life deals with the many ways living species depend on abundant, clean water, and begins the examination of what we, as individuals, can do to protect our aquatic resources.
  
  
• Water For Work considers how water is and has been used in industry. This section includes a discussion of primary and heavy industries, the role of water in the transportation of goods, the aquaculture industry, and hydroelectric power production. The section concludes with an activity designed to help students recognize the multitude of viewpoints involved in water resource management.
  
  
• How We Affect Water speaks to the issue of environmental stewardship.
  
  
• Water Dangers includes a brief examination of the relationship between water, human society, and the weather.

You might wish to refer to this document as a resource for water-education information and activities – you might even choose to use information from this Resource as a segment of your science program. Portions of this Resource are suitable for use as enrichment activities. You might also find this document useful as a resource for science fairs or school projects.

We hope you find this Resource helpful. We welcome your suggestions for future publications.

Water Pre/Post Assessment

Use this assessment to discover how much your students already know about water before you begin your water unit(s), or later, as a conclusion to your study. You may choose to instruct students to perform one or more of the following activities, depending on the focus of your study.

• Using circular cutouts, make a water molecule and label the two elements of water.
  
  
• Take a cup of water and tell how you would change the liquid to a solid or to a gas.
  
  
• Demonstrate one of the five properties of water using things around your home.
  
  
• Draw a diagram of the water cycle.
  
  
• Choose an animal, describe its habitat, and give examples of how it uses water.
  
  
• Devise a method to remove the salt from seawater.
  
  
• Estimate how much water you use in a day.
  
  
• Develop and test a plan to reduce the water you use by 25% per day.
  
  
• Tell how you would determine if a stream is polluted.

"Quickie" Ideas and Activities

Prepare a bulletin board with some of the student's works during their water/ecology unit. You may want to produce a board displaying the uses of water; a section with newspaper and magazine clippings of current or historic water issues; photos of how water and living things are related; or of the water cycle.

• Plan an art activity using water-based paints and sponges.
  
  
• Have the class put together a shadow box or diorama on the theme of "water".
  
  
• Have your students write and perform a "water" play or puppet show for younger students.
  
  
• Take an erosion hike and spot examples of water damage – either natural or made by humans.
  
  
• Study Aboriginal water legends and mythologies or water legends and myths from foreign lands.
  
  
• Have the class develop their own classroom water laws and penalties (for example: forgetting to turn off water – lose a recess period; running the water to let it get cold before drinking – write a conservation poem; etc.)
  
  
• Have the class put together a resolution to save water and have the resolution signed by the principal.
  
  
• Develop a conservation mandate for your school.
  
  
• Set up a display in the school cafeteria or assembly area showing how water can be conserved by even the youngest students.
  
  
• Create posters and/or projects about how early settlers, Aboriginal peoples, and/or people from developing nations and other lands have used water historically, their water use patterns, or their conservation habits.
  
  
• Have the students study the source of their water supply. Is it in danger of becoming polluted? Study any polluted lakes, rivers, streams in your area. What are the effects that can be seen? What about those we don't see?
  
  
• Can your class volunteer with a local agency to do clean up, etc., at a local lake, stream or recreation area?
  
  
• Put together a People's Water Court and stage a mock trial for a major water polluter or waster.
  
  
• Study the major rivers in Canada.
  
  
• Study groundwater sources in other parts of the world (just learning to say "Ogallala Aquifer" – one of the United States' largest aquifers – can be fun!).
  
  
• Study the habitat and life cycles of native aquatic species.
  
  
• Study water pollution and the types of pollution – disease carrying agents, inorganic and organic chemicals, plant nutrients, sediment, heat, radioactive substances, oxygen demanding wastes, synthetic organic chemicals.
  
  
• Develop an environmental and/or water textbook of clippings from newspapers, magazines, etc.. Keep them in a looseleaf notebook (don't forget cartoons!). Be sure to label all articles with the name of the publication, date and page number. Have students write summaries or interpretation of the articles. This activity can also be done on an individual level with the creation of a water journal.
  
  
• Make a sediment dam in an empty pop bottle. Pour a few tablespoons of soil into an empty pop bottle and fill almost to the top with tap water. Shake the bottle to show how sediment mixes with water. When left alone, undisturbed for several hours, the sediment will settle to the bottom of the bottle, just like it does in a sediment dam.
  
  
• Ask your local Department of Environment, Department of Natural Resources, or Environment Canada representative for a map of your local watershed.
  
  
• Ask an water resource professional to visit your class to discuss relevant issues (eg: how and why dams are built).
  
  
• Make a display of "water quotes" (some parables and quotations are included in this Resource). Can your students make up their own quotes and/or add to the quotations and parables in this document?
  
  
• Set up a learning centre using the worksheets from this document as well as others you have found or developed.

Have Fun!!

Water Facts

The Developing World

• The World Health Organization estimates that between 2 million and 5 million people die each year from diseases caused by unsafe drinking water, lack of sanitation and insufficient water for hygiene. Sixty percent of these people are young children. Most of these diseases are related directly to water, and include: water-borne diseases spread by drinking or washing hand or food utensils in contaminated water; water washed diseases spread by poor personal hygiene, insufficient water for washing and lack of facilities for the sanitary disposal of human waste; water based diseases transmitted by a vector which spends part of its life cycle in water. Contact with infected water allows the parasite to enter humans through the skin, eyes or mouth; diseases with water-related vectors passed through infection carrying insects breeding in stagnant water; and faecal disposal diseases, caused by organisms breeding in waste when sanitation is inadequate.
  
  
• Worldwide, about 1.3 billion people (about 26% of the world's population) lack safe drinking water and 1.7 billion (34%) lack adequate water for sanitation.
  
  
• Nearly half of the developing world does not have access to safe water.
  
  
• Eighty percent of the rural population of more than 70 African and Asian countries do not have access to safe drinking water.
  
  
• One quarter of the world's population lack safe drinking water and sanitation.

Canada

• According to Environment Canada, Canadians are among the biggest water users in the world. Nearly all of our economic and social activities depend on water.
  
  
• Almost 9%, or 891 163 square kilometres, of Canada’s total area is covered by fresh water. Our rivers and lakes contain enough water to flood the entire country to a depth of more than two metres.
  
  
• Canada holds seven percent of the global supply of accessible fresh water.
  
  
• Twenty-six percent of Canadians rely on groundwater for domestic use.
  
  
• Of the 10 most highly-valued species of fish in Lake Ontario, three have disappeared.
  
  
• The Great Lakes Basin contains three quarters of Canada's industrial activity, almost two thirds of our total population and almost half the dollar value of total Canadian agricultural production.
  
  
• More than 350 chemical compounds have been found in the Great Lakes ecosystem. Among them are an alarming number of toxic chemicals.

Water Quality

• In developing nations, 80% of diseases are water-related.
  
  
• One drop of oil can render up to 25 litres of water unfit for drinking.
  
  
• One gram of 2,4-D (a common household herbicide) can contaminate ten million litres of drinking water.
  
  
• One gram of PCBs can make up to one billion litres of water unsuitable for freshwater aquatic life.
  
  
• One gram of lead in 20 000 litres of water makes the water unfit for drinking. Older homes often contain plumbing made of lead or soldered in lead, which can leach into the water.
  
  
• The nitrates in fertilizers promote excessive growth of algae and larger aquatic plants, causing algal blooms the drive out sport fish out of their habitat.
  
  
• Calcium and magnesium – both essential elements for humans – account for most water hardness. Death rates for certain types of cardiovascular disease have been found to be higher in soft water areas than in hard water areas in many parts of the world.
  
  
• Copper is another essential element – for optimal absorption and metabolism of iron and for bone formation – and fairly common in natural water. More than one milligram per litre may make water unpalatable.

Water Consumption – Some Comparisons

• The average human needs approximately 5.7 litres of water per day for drinking and cooking. That's approximately the same amount of water used when a person in the industrialized world leaves a tap running for 20 to 40 seconds.
  
  
• It takes between 25 and 45 litres of water per day to cover a person's basic health and sanitation needs. It takes 70 litres of water to refine one litre of gasoline.
  
  
• The average seven-member family in developing nations uses approximately 58 litres of water in one day. In North America, the average four-member family uses more than 850 litres of water per day.
  
  
• The average cost of 58 litres of water in developing nations equals 15 minutes of pay. The average cost of 850 litres of water in North America equals about six minutes of pay.
  
  
• One woman in a developing nation can carry between 15 and 22 litres of water home from a single trip to the village well – if she is lucky enough to live in a village with a well. The standard North American toilet uses approximately 18 litres of water each time it is flushed.

The Cost of Water in Developing Countries

In many countries, water is not readily available, so it must be drawn from a well or source of running water, often by women and children, many of whom walk three or four hours each day to fetch enough water for their families' needs. A daily trek such as this consumes more than 600 calories, half the minimal daily intake of calories in a healthy person. It also uses up valuable hours when the women might be learning income-generating skills necessary to realize a better standard of living for their families.

When children share in the water carrying duties, instead of a journey to school, their day begins with a long, difficult and exhausting walk. Carrying a heavy weight can cause damage to young bodies, and the time they spend fetching water deprives children of valuable school time. Very often, ten- or eleven-year-old children are taken out of school simply because they are needed to keep a supply of water coming into their villages.

The average person needs to consume nearly three litres of water a day to stay healthy. More is needed for washing, cooking and cleaning. The average woman in a developing country may carry 15 to 22 litres of water in one trip. A child, of course, carries much less.

A Classroom Activity: Have your students measure 15 litres of water into a large bucket or several smaller buckets (this is probably best accomplished out-of-doors). See who, if anyone, can lift this much water and walk some distance with it. Measure smaller amounts. See how far the students can walk without spilling any water, and how long they can carry the water before they begin to be uncomfortable. Ask them what they think it would be like to carry that much water every day for three or four hours.

Oral Re-hydration Therapy (ORT)

Every six seconds a child dies as a result of a diarrhoeal disease. Each year, five million children are victims of such diseases, making diarrhea the world's number-one cause of death in children under five years of age.

There is a simple, inexpensive and effective way to prevent and treat the dehydration and eventual death that results from most diarrhoeal disease. It's called Oral Re-hydration Therapy (ORT). Major heath aid and development agencies, such as the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Red Cross and UNICEF, administer major long-term projects in underdeveloped countries to promote ORT on two levels. The first level involves prevention of death by dehydration among infants and young children; the second is the provision of emergency care for extreme cases.

Preventative ORT requires three very simple ingredients, and some basic education about the causes and effects of diarrhea. UNICEF and the Red Cross send delegates into towns and villages in developing countries to tell parents about the health problems caused by unclean water and unsanitary living conditions, and to show them how to mix an oral re-hydration solution in their homes. In extreme cases, prepackaged ORT salts¹ are used to save lives. When mixed with clean drinking water, these salts form a solution that can save a victim from even extreme dehydration.

What are the effects of dehydration? To exemplify the effects of dehydration on the human body, perform the following experiment:

1. Cut a thin slice from a raw potato (about 0.5 cm thick). Trace the outline of the slice on a piece of paper.
2. Make a small hole near one end of the slice with a pencil.
3. Thread a length of string through the potato slice. Tie a knot, and hang the slice to dry.
4. Record how long it takes for the slice to dry, and when it has dried, compare it to the original tracing of the potato. What has happened? Ask students: if this happened to the their bodies, inside and out, what do they think it would feel like?

¹ Sodium chloride (salt), sodium hydrogen carbonate (sodium bicarbonate, or baking soda), potassium chloride, glucose (sugar)

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