Students will write and may choose to sign a personal safe water pledge. Students may communicate their advocacy for water sustainability to others through social media, posters, artistic expression, or other method. They may start a campaign to promote the drinking of tap water in reusable bottles rather than drinking from disposable water bottles. Youth may spread the word through posters and other advertisements, or they may try to ban disposable water bottles for sale at their school.

Anticipatory Set

Remind the students that people in some areas in the world do not have access to clean water. Read the following excerpt from UNICEF (http://www.unicef.org/wash/) about clean water: Almost 50 percent of the developing world’s population—2.5 billion people—lack improved sanitation facilities, and over 884 million people still use unsafe drinking water sources... Poor sanitation, water and hygiene have many other serious repercussions. Children—and particularly girls—are denied their right to education because their schools lack private and decent sanitation facilities. Women are forced to spend large parts of their day fetching water. Poor farmers and wage earners are less productive due to illness, health systems are overwhelmed and national economies suffer. Without WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene), sustainable development is impossible. Define environmental stewardship as the careful and responsible management of our environment.

• Define sustainability as a method of using resources so they are not damaged permanently (preserved for future generations). Display this quotation: "There's only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self.  So you have to begin there, not outside, not on other people.  That comes afterward, when you've worked on your own corner."  Aldous Huxley, Time Must Have a Stop
• Ask students to brainstorm what they personally can do to conserve and sustain safe water. If time, groups of students can research water issues and ideas for conservations and sustainability at these websites:

Lawmakers discussing regulations on water bottlers.  http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Health/story?id=8031551&page=1

World Water Council: http://www.worldwatercouncil.org/index.php?id=25

Global Stewards.org http://www.globalstewards.org/water.htm

Sustainable Water http://www.epa.gov/sustainability/water.htm

Global Water Challenge, sign-up to be a Water Warrior http://www.globalwaterchallenge.org/warriors/warriors-home.php 

The Water Project http://thewaterproject.org/how-to-give-clean-water.asp

Annie Leonard’s video on the environmental cost of water bottles: http://storyofstuff.org/bottledwater/

• As a group, create a "Safe Water Pledge" that students may choose to sign as their commitment to assuring and maintaining global safe water for the common good. The pledge may include that brainstormed list for students to check those things they pledge to do.
• Have the students work in groups to create informational and persuasive posters (or another artistic expression) to display around the school and community. The product should inform and encourage others to get involved in promoting sustainable water-use practices (avoid pouring toxic chemicals in the drains, use environmentally friendly soaps, conserve water, recycle “gray water,” harvest rainwater).
• Determine the best places to display their products, share the information, and ask others to sign their class created safe water pledge.

   

Social Studies/Science: Read and discuss the following about sewage treatment in developing countries. Is clean water a human right? The following text is from Wikipedia under Sewage Treatment in Developing Countries: “Few reliable figures on the share of the wastewater collected in sewers that is being treated in the world exist. In many developing countries the bulk of domestic and industrial wastewater is discharged without any treatment or after primary treatment only. In Latin America about 15% of collected wastewater passes through treatment plants (with varying levels of actual treatment). In Venezuela, a below average country in South America with respect to wastewater treatment, 97 percent of the country’s sewage is discharged raw into the environment. In a relatively developed Middle Eastern country such as Iran, Tehran’s majority of population has totally untreated sewage injected to the city’s groundwater. In Israel, about 50 percent of agricultural water usage (total use was 1 billion cubic meters in 2008) is provided through reclaimed sewer water. Future plans call for increased use of treated sewer water as well as more desalination plants. Most of sub-Saharan Africa is without wastewater treatment.”

• Lawmakers discussing regulations on water bottlers.  http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Health/story?id=8031551&page=1
• World Water Council: http://www.worldwatercouncil.org/index.php?id=25
• Global Stewards.org http://www.globalstewards.org/water.htm
• Sustainable Water http://www.epa.gov/sustainability/water.htm
• Global Water Challenge, sign-up to be a Water Warrior http://www.globalwaterchallenge.org/warriors/warriors-home.php 
• The Water Project http://thewaterproject.org/how-to-give-clean-water.asp
• Annie Leonard’s video on the environmental cost of water bottles: http://storyofstuff.org/bottledwater/