What is a watershed?

Izaak Walton League

In this activity students build a model of a watershed to learn where water goes when it rains. Students then make predictions and draw what they observe.

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Notes from our reviewers

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Educators might consider doing this activity outside with younger students as it involves water and spray bottles. Educators may wish to discuss scientific modeling with students ahead of time. Students would benefit from activities on the water cycle in tandem with this lesson. Educators seeking to discuss climate change will need to find additional resources to connect the topic of watersheds and water flow to climate change impacts and solutions (drought, flooding, water pollution, etc.).
Students learn to answer the following questions: What is a watershed? Where does rain go after it falls? The educator is prompted to ask students' questions throughout the lesson, enhancing their reflections on what they observe and addressing any misconceptions they might have about how water travels. Passed initial science review - expert science review pending.
The hands-on, inquiry-based modeling and mapping activity, done in small groups, will engage learners with many learning styles. Teacher guide information is short but of good quality. A brief video is provided as supplemental information to help define and describe a watershed by the Battle River Water Alliance out of Alberta, Canada. The lesson lists prerequisite skills required (familiarity with scientific models and modeling natural processes).
May need to obtain florist foam and aluminum cake pans outside of school. Though some materials may not be found in a standard elementary school classroom, many can be obtained easily from an art room or at low cost. Florist foam is not necessary for this model-anything that creates a peak or mountainous form will work: balled up paper, cone, pyramid, tin foil, clay. There will be some prep time required for educators to find all materials. The link to the source of the lesson is broken (but a similar one is found here: [link https://www.iwla.org/docs/default-source/how-to/how_to_build-a-model-watershed.pdf?sfvrsn=8]).