Each year Houston County holds a Groundwater Education Day. The 2004 event was held at Wallace Community College on October 29 in Dothan, Alabama. Some individuals may ask, why a Groundwater Education Day?
The entire population of Houston County, like other counties in Alabama, is solely dependent on groundwater for their drinking water needs. Consequently, it's imperative that children learn where their drinking water comes from, how to protect it, and how to keep it clean now and for future generations. In addition, the event motivates students and adults to develop an overall general environmental awareness and stewardship ethic to help protect related natural resources such as storm water, surface water, wetlands, forestry, and wildlife.
The event was tailored for fourth grade students because the consensus among event planners was that this age group is able to understand groundwater concepts and is still young enough to develop their own value system. Approximately 1200 students from the Dothan City and Houston County schools, their teachers, and over 60 volunteers participated in the event. Students participated in three hands-on learning activities that included a drop in the bucket, edible aquifer, and water filtration. The drop in the bucket activity allowed students to learn just how little fresh water is available for plants, animals, and humans and how important it is to protect and conserve this precious natural resource.
In the next activity, students used vanilla ice cream, soda, and ice cubes to build an edible aquifer and then used chocolate sprinkles and chocolate syrup as pollutants. The sprinkles and syrup dissolved in their edible aquifer to show how pollutants enter and spread through an aquifer. The final activity was water filtration, which students filtered vinegar (battery acid), vegetable oil (motor oil), and soil (sediment) through a coffee filter and cheesecloth. They learned they could not filter all the vinegar and vegetable oil from the water, which taught the students that it is much better to prevent pollutants from entering the water rather than trying to clean it up.
According to school officials, the event has been the fourth graders favorite field trip and they always look forward to attending the event every year. Post evaluations from volunteers and teachers indicate that the event is so successful because of the important issue of natural resources education, hands-on activities for the students, and the well organized planning of the event. The Alabama Department of Environmental Management is training instructors and is planning to help other counties host future Groundwater Education Days.