Grant Type 3: Community or School Awareness Campaign

1. Summary

This grant will encourage elementary students to become citizens who are aware of the importance of conserving water. This will be a cross-curricular project for the 2015-2016 school year that includes literature connections, letter and pamphlet writing, scientific concepts linked to the NGSSS, mathematics, technology-based research and engineering/building skills. The students will be actively engaged in learning about watersheds, the water cycle and water conservation through books, PowerPoint’s, hands-on activities, letter writing with students their same age and a trip to the Plant City Wastewater Treatment Plant.

2. Activities

Mid Fall – Students will learn about watersheds using the table model we have at school. We will use a water cycle PowerPoint to further their knowledge of the connectivity of all water on earth. Reading teachers will use literature books to add to their expanding knowledge. Students will be linked with a pen pal to write about their understandings.

Late Fall – Students will bring in their own water bills so we can identify the amount of water being used in their homes (we will calculate per person usage, estimate the amount used by the whole school). We will identify one way to conserve water at home and students will implement the change. Posters will be made and hung around school with water saving tips. Garden club members will visit to help brainstorm and encourage conservation. Write to pen pals about how and why they will implement this change.

Winter – Students will use Legos to model the water cycle and alternative ways to conserve water. Students will be challenged to build or draw a model of a tool that could be invented to conserve water either at home, at school or in public restrooms. Create additional posters on water-saving importance with water facts from Internet research. Continually use literature pieces for ideas and use of computers in the classroom for research. Write to pen pals about ways to conserve.

Early Spring – Students will take a trip to the Plant City Wastewater Treatment Plant to see the real world connection to sewage and the importance of conserving. They will learn about potable and reclaimed water, their water bills at home, time and resources needed to clean wastewater, lab tools and procedures, and technology available to test cleanliness of water. Write to pen pals about field experience.

Mid Spring – Students will use their notes, background knowledge and Internet resources to create a pamphlet of information to pass out to community members. Garden club members will be available to help pass out pamphlets. Students will bring in their latest water bill so we can calculate the difference in water use to determine if they were successful in conserving water.

3. Project Message

Our students will be informing their families of their knowledge of water cycles, watersheds and conservation when they bring home a plan of how to conserve water at home. The parents will be asked to give a copy of their water bill to the student for school use and will be asked to implement a change in water consumption. We will also be writing with pen pals at various times throughout the year – students of the same age from another school. The pamphlets that the students create at the end of the project will be distributed to community members in our area as we walk down to our public library and pass them out. We will also ask Plant City Garden Club members to distribute them on our behalf. Garden Club members will also be invited to speak to students about water conservation and its importance.

4. Stem Connection

We will be using the water cycle PowerPoint and literature connections as engagement for children. The students will be able to utilize technology themselves when creating pamphlets and researching for their posters. They will be using Publisher, learning about internet safety and how to use search engines. The students will be engineering when they use Legos to build models. They may choose to use other supplies handy to build a model of a tool that could be used to increase conservation of water. Mathematics is involved when students determine the per person use of water via their water bills. We can also estimate the water use of the entire school after we have averaged the per person usage. Science is the thread throughout the whole project. Students will be practicing science skills, understanding the real world application of the standards and learning about the interdependence of all living things.

Budget