Objective:

Students will examine:

• the different ways that they use water in the home.
• how much water is actually used for various activities.
• recognize ways that they can cut down on water usage in their own home.

Materials:
* copies of the Personal Water Use Survey

Procedure:

1. Ask the students to name all of the ways they use water in a typical day. List them. Show the students a gallon jug of water and ask them to estimate how many gallons they use in a day.
2. Have the students write the list from the board. Tell them that over the next 24 hours they are to keep track of the ways they use water by noting them on the paper. Example, one student might flush the toilet 5 times, wash his hands 8 times, brush her teeth 3 times, etc. Ask them to record uses of water that they may not have listed in class.
3. The next day, show students the chart, but with the final area (Water Conserving Methods) covered. Tell them these are the average water uses in a home. Point out that if some of these seem high, it is because of the way we use water, i.e., letting the water get cold before we use it.
4. Have the students estimate the gallons they used in the 24-hour period.
5. Lead a discussion about the class's findings.
   · How much water did you estimate you personally used in the 24 hour period?
   · People in the US use 100-150 gallons of water per person per day. How does your use compare with this average?
   · Imagine you did not have plumbing in your house, that you had to carry water from a well. Would this change the amount of water you used? How do you think your water use would be different?
   · What simple, routine steps could you take to reduce the amount of water used in a day?
6. Uncover the Water Conserving Methods section and talk about the methods listed. How hard would it be to actually follow these methods?
7. Have students log their water use for another 24 hours, this time trying out as many water-saving methods as they can.
8. Ask students to calculate their water usage and compare the two days. Lead a discussion about the results:
   · How much did your water consumption change from the first 24-hour period?
   · What were the biggest reasons for the change?
   · For which tasks was it easier to save water?
   · For which tasks was it hard?
   · If you were only allowed 25 gallons of water per day, how would you use your 25 gallons? How would you cut back?
   · Choose three different water saving methods that you could use routinely. How much water would you save in a month if you were to use these three methods every day?

Discussion:

Responses to seek:

Where does our water come from?

Most students may think that water comes from a faucet but where does it really come from? What is your water source?

What happens to water that goes down the drain?

Concept of water treatment, septic tanks, pollution

Why is water important to people?

It is the source of all life and clean, drinkable water is limited.

Why do you think we should be concerned about water?

Awareness of pollution and water usage

What water saving ideas did you learn?

Opportunities for taking personal responsibility for saving water

For more information go to www.watershare.usbr.gov/

 

This activity is available as an Adobe PDF.

This activity is a modified Water Share activity by the Bureau of Reclamation.