Megan R. Garrison Return to Earth Science Lesson Plan Menu
East Side Middle School, Manhattan
Summer 2001
What
Impact Do Humans Have on the Environment?
A Standards driven project that seeks to create a scientific understanding of, and appreciation for, The Hudson River.
Project Description
Government agencies cannot control all the collective and individual actions that may harm our environment; thus it is important for everyone to play a role in the stewardship of the natural world. To this end, the goal of this project is to create an opportunity for students to develop a student-based river monitoring program that will lead to an understanding of how the natural world affects our lives and in turn, how we impact the natural world.
By focusing on a nearby local body of water, The Hudson River, students in the East Side Science Club will explore the impact that humans have on one of New York’s watersheds by conducting a variety of laboratory experiments and activities which will prepare them for a culminating watershed investigation.
Introductory Laboratory Experiment
The first task is for students to have an opportunity to investigate how the slope of a stream or river and the volume of water it contains affect its speed by interpreting data to see how different factors affect water flow.
Problem: *Start a discussion with students about why different water systems travel at different speeds. Ask them to create a problem (similar to the one above) that they can then solve in class.
“How do the slope of a river and the volume of water it contains affect its speed?”
Materials: meter stick, pencils, wooden blocks, water, stopwatch, plastic tub, 2 100 ml beakers, rain gutter section, and food coloring in a squeeze bottle.
Procedure: *Challenge students to create a step by step procedure that they will then follow in order to solve their problem. (Similar to below)
¨ Mark an “S” at one end of the gutter representing the stream source. Mark and “M” at the other end of the gutter representing the stream’s mouth.
¨ About 10 cm from the source end, draw a dark line across the inside of the gutter and measure 100-cm toward the mouth end from the first line. Draw a second line across the gutter.
¨ Place the plastic tub under the mouth of the gutter to collect the water.
¨ Place enough blocks under the source end to raise it 5 cm above the tub.
¨ Record the number of blocks on a data chart.
¨ Slowly pour water from one beaker into the source end of the gutter. A second person should add one drop of food coloring at the source end, above the “S” line. A third person should begin timing when the food coloring first reaches the “S” line. Stop timing when the food coloring reaches the “M” line. Record the time on data table.
¨ Complete steps above for a second time, but increase the water volume in the stream by pouring from two beakers at the same time.
¨ This time increase the slope of the stream by adding blocks to raise the source end 5-cm higher.
¨ Complete steps again continuously raising the water volume and slope. Record results.
Results
& Discussion:
*Challenge students to calculate the average stream speed for each experiment.
(Speed of stream cm/s = distance (100 cm/average time s)
*Discuss the different results obtained by the groups in the class.
Questions:
¨ How did the speed of the stream change when you increased the volume of the water?
¨ How did the speed of the stream change when you increased the slope?
¨ How can this experiment help us in understanding how pollution moves through the Hudson River?
Have students create additional questions for discussion.
Standards
The implementation of this project will provide a host of opportunities for students to meet both the national and New York State Science Standards.
A list follows:
¨
properties and changes of properties of objects and materials
¨
transfer of energy and the nature of a chemical reaction
¨
the water cycle
¨
motion and forces
¨ geo chemical cycles, such as conservation of matter, chemical resources and movement of matter between chemical reservoirs
¨ natural resource management
¨ properties of earth materials, such as water and gases and the properties of rocks and soil
¨ energy in the earth system