The Science of pollution in our rivers and creeks

After the students were seated and ready for class I explained that tomorrow our visiting artist would arrive to teach the art of watercolor. Today we would be performing a Science experiment to see how what we do can impact the environment. I had the students gather bits of grass from outside, scrap paper and tissue, and one student filled a clear tub with water. I placed a box on top of the clear tub of water. The box had 3 holes in it to represent the drainage from our yards. The students added in the grass, paper and then I poured vegtable oil on top to represent the improper disposal of oil in the environment. I also added 3 drops of green food coloring to represent the pesticides in our environment. The class added sound effects such as thunder and rain and one student acted as mother nature and poured water on top. We successfully polluted the clean water! Our discussion included ways we can act to prevent pollution. The students had lots of great ideas and reflection on past experience such as visiting a cave in our area and learning that our pollution effects the cave ecosystem.