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Listed under:  Science  >  Life  >  Ecosystems  >  Biogeochemical cycles  >  Water cycle
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Every drop counts, being water wise!

This activity aims to explore water usage and water saving ideas. Every drop counts! OUTCOMES are for children to: understand the importance of water; look at ways to help save water; and undertake a water audit.

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Catchment management: the story of a river

Water moves through the environment by the Water Cycle. This activity investigates the journey of a river through the catchment. It is part of a sequence of 5 individual learning activities designed to support understandings of catchment management. Follow water through the environment and explore the changes to water quality ...

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Exploring the story of water

Investigate the journey of water through the environment, from the mountains to the sea through an active demonstration. Discover and discuss changes to quality of the water on this journey through the environment? OUTCOMES of this learning activity are for students to: understand the journey of water from taps to the ocean; ...

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Why is water sticky?

In this lesson sequence, students use a range of hands-on activities to explore what water is and how it behaves as it changes from ice to liquid water to water vapour. They explore the structure of water molecules and how these molecules behave when water is heated and cooled to help them to understand how the water cycle works.

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Using Whizzy's storybooks

These lessons use a story-telling content and are designed to promote student understanding of why water is vital to living things, sources and uses of water, how water changes in the water cycle and why and how to use water wisely.

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How much rain?

In this lesson sequence, students participate in a puzzle hunt in the school grounds to find letter clues that lead to the location of a special gift (a rain gauge) related to water. Students then make rain gauges and record rainfall in the school grounds with both the hand-made and commercial rain gauges.

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Solar still activity

In this activity students create a solar still and use a predict-observe-explain strategy to investigate how coloured salty water transforms into clear unsalted water. This activity is useful for exploring changes of state (evaporation and condensation) and water cycles.

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Are we living sustainably?

This unit of eight lessons poses the question ‘Are we living sustainably?’ Students use prompts to draw on their prior knowledge to explain what they already know about sustainability. They then investigate why water is precious, explore how water is used around their school and at home. Students then research ways that ...

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How is water used?

In this lesson, students investigate the variety of ways water is used by plants and humans in four workstation activities.

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Where does rain go?

In this activity, students explore what happens to rain falling on different surfaces.

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Water is special

In this lesson sequence, students explore what water is and how it behaves as it changes from ice to liquid water to water vapour. The purpose of this lesson sequence is to give students a mental picture of water molecules. Learning about how these molecules behave when water is heated and cooled can help them to understand ...

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How does water change?

In this lesson, students explore the properties of water using their senses. This activity is useful as a quick introduction to the topic

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How my water travels

In this lesson sequence, students explore what happens as water soaks into or runs over the ground. They gain an understanding of a catchment from a sandpit model that show how water moves across the landscape. Students then trace the journey that their water takes every day, from catchment or aquifer to tap.

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The Murray-Darling Basin: an introduction

This lesson sequence is designed to introduce students to key aspects of the Murray-Darling Basin including the environment, geography, economy, people, history, water cycle and water management challenges. The lesson sequence includes a teacher PowerPoint presentation, separate teacher notes and a student worksheet. This ...

Video

Wastewater: treated well, it's not just a waste

This set of three short videos shows the treatment processes for wastewater in a first world community. Process engineers talk about wastewater and how they treat it.

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Science for a hungry world

How vital is water to food production? What would happen if we ran out of readily available water? This is a real possibility for some countries that rely heavily on groundwater to grow crops and sustain local population. By observing the gravity of the Earth, NASA satellites have been able to track the changes in the amount ...

Video

ABC News: Getting your facts straight about water use

We hear a lot about water use in Australia. What are the real statistics about water use? What is the breakdown of water use for different groups across Australia? Watch this clip to find out who uses water and how much, and consider the value of water and the 'return' on this use for the Australian economy. The figures ...

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Water quality and the Murray-Darling Basin

This lesson sequence examines the issue of water quality in the Murray-Darling Basin: why it is important, what are the indicators of water quality and ways to monitor water quality. It includes a teacher PowerPoint presentation, separate teacher notes and a student worksheet. This lesson sequence is one in a series exploring ...

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Investigating Australian approaches to producing fish, seafood and meat

This is a unit of work about the Australian fish, seafood and meat industries. It has a particular focus on farming practices, processing methods and how food is brought to customers. The resource explores: where meat, seafood and fish come from; past, present and future farming and production systems; and a range of related ...

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Locks, Weirs and Dams

This lesson sequence examines structures that are used by water resource managers in the Murray-Darling Basin including dams, locks, weirs, barrages, fishways, channels and levee banks and explores the positive and negative effects of river regulation. It includes a teacher PowerPoint presentation, separate teacher notes ...