Summary
| Subject keyword(s) | Conservation, Cycles, Earth's water, Earth and space science, Earth materials, Ecology, Forestry and Agriculture, Ecosystems, Geoscience, Humans and the environment, Life science, Personal and social issues, Pollution, Water, Water cycle |
|---|---|
| Grade level | Elementary School, Middle School, High School, Vocational/Professional Development Education |
| Intended audience | Educator |
| Resource type | Instructional Material |
| Resource format | image, image/jpeg, text, text/html |
| Rights | Copyright July 2007 The Ohio State University |
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Home Math Pathway Science Pathway Project Partners Search Entire Site Math Pathway Science Pathway for Table Of Contents What Goes Around Comes Around: The Water Cycle Introduction Background Information for Teachers Lessons and Activities about the Properties of Water Lessons and Activities Reviewing the Water Cycle Lessons and Activities Investigating Human Impacts National Science Education Standards Latest Version Introduction This is the second publication in our series called What Goes Around Comes Around. The first publication covers the topic of the carbon cycle and the third, nitrogen cycle. When it’s raining, waters always draining, Flowing down into the woodland stream. Girls: Some will come directly down. Boys: Some will come in from the ground. Girls: All around. Boys: From the ground. Ohh... from Land and Water, sung to the tune of Alouette. A children's song conveys the water cycle to elementary studentsa series of steps involving changing states of matter through the processes of evaporation, transpiration, condensation, and precipitation. In middle school, students can begin to investigate the chemical and physical properties of water that enable it to behave in ways necessary for the water cycle to happen. As we did in The Carbon Cycle, we will assume students have been exposed to the water cycle but lack understanding of the more abstract properties of water. Thus, some of the resources here will facilitate student investigation and understanding of the properties of water and its role in and out of living things. An understanding of the nature of H2O combined with previous knowledge of the water cycle will enable students to explore real-world issues of water pollution; water conservation; water purification; water management; and the impacts of road, bridge, dam, parking lot, and other construction. We all know water is essential for life, but do we ever ask why? Exactly what does water do for living things that's so important? The first resource in Background Information for Teachers addresses this question in a general and comprehensible way. Water, being essential to life, is highly valued in most cultures and care should be taken with its management. But if it’s a renewable resource and if it cycles as we are taught it does, how can there be such a thing as a water shortage? The resources here will provide you with content information as well as lessons and activities to guide your students to deeper understandings of the nature of water, the need for and intricacies of its management, and why water management issues can be difficult and emotional. by Mary LeFever Mary LeFever is a resource specialist for the Middle School Portal, and a doctoral candidate in science education at Ohio State University. She has taught middle school and high school science and is an adjunct instructor of biology and natural sciences at Columbus State Community College. Please email any comments to msp@msteacher.org. Back to top Copyright July 2007 — The Ohio State University. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0424671. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. About | Funded by NSF | Contact This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License. Science Publications