Watersheds & Water Management
__Outdoor Education__________
Watersheds & Water Management
Year Round
Instructors will take students to a trail in Summit County where they can make observations about our local watershed. They may make a model of the watershed they see around them. They may test for chemicals in a local stream.
Exploration
Exploration based learning involves observation making, then asking questions or playing a game about their observation. If teachers choose an exploration lens, they may want their students to focus on one of the following topics within Watersheds and Water Management.
Water Cycle
Students explore watersheds and water management through sensory-based activities, engaging games, and inquiry-based learning.
Students will explore a watershed from top to bottom. They will be asked to name what parts of the water cycle happen throughout our Summit County watershed.
Program Standards:
NGSS-5-ESS2-2, NGSS-MS-ESS2-4, NGSS-5-ESS2-2, NGSS-MS-ESS2-4, NGSS-5-ESS3-1
Water Quality & Human Impacts
Students will perform a stream survey to assess the health of a river. They will be asked to consider how their results relate to where the stream is located within the watershed and what might contribute to pollution.
Students explore where usable water comes from and how water resources are used in Colorado. Students study water management through the lens of a stakeholder. Acting as their stakeholder, students discuss the issues and come together at the end of the program for a “Town Hall Meeting” to open a dialogue, collaborate, and offer solutions. This program teaches students to collaborate as opposed to compete in order to accomplish a common goal, and discuss a challenging environmental issue facing their community.
Program Standards:
NGSS-5-ESS3-1 NGSS-MS-ESS3-4 NGSS-HS-LS2-7
Environmental Issue
This is an academically rigorous selection where students will learn about watersheds & water management from a stakeholder’s view on a local environmental issue. On the last day, students come together in a “Town Hall” format to debate the issue.
Only offered April – November
Students will learn about the proposal for construction that would raise the height of a dam to increase reservoir capacity. On the first day, students will be given a stakeholder and encouraged to learn about this proposal from that stakeholder’s perspective. Instructors will take students to a trail in Summit County where students can make observations about our local watershed and apply their observations to this issue. On the last day of the program, all students will come together in a Town Hall format and debate the issue, focusing on these key questions:
- Will your stakeholder benefit more from the water being moved to the Front Range or would it benefit you more to have it stay on the Western Slope?
- Do you agree with the proposal as it stands? What conditions would you add or modify to this proposal to see it passed?
- What alternative solution to raising the dam height do you propose?
At the end of the program, students will reflect on their experience and what it was like to think critically from a different perspective.
This is an academically rigorous selection. Students will still be learning outside but will spend significantly less time team building. If you choose this option for your class, we recommend that teachers are prepared to frontload information in the classroom. If you would like to learn more about this option, please contact us at least a month before your trip at bookings@keystonescienceschool.org.
