The Blair County Conservation District offers its annual Water Festival to all Grade 4 classes in Blair County public and private schools. Water Festival is a hands-on learning program with three to four different stations described below. The event prepares students for part of the Environment and Ecology section of the PSSA’s.
Instructors for the annual Water Festival are District employees which including J.T. Bandzuh (Conservation Education Specialist), Chelsey Ergler (Stormwater Coordinator), Tyne Blazier (Resource Conservation Technician).
All instructors and volunteers have recent clearances on file at the District Office.
Each station will take between 30-40 minutes. Teachers should plan to devote an entire morning or afternoon to the program.
Station Descriptions:
Macro-invertebrates and Stream Water Quality: Standard 4.1.4.D., 4.2.4C., 4.3.4.A.
Students catch “live” stream macro-invertebrates and identify them using a dichotomous key. In a game called “Macro Mania,” students learn about the influence of land use on water quality and the practice of macro-invertebrate sampling to quantify it.
Enviroscape: Standard 4.1.4.E., 4.5.4.C., 4.2.4.A., 4.3.4.A.
Students discover how their school district is part of a watershed, how this watershed can become polluted, and what can be done about it. It uses a large plastic watershed model, colored powder for the pollutants, and a spray bottle to illustrate rain.
Rain to Drain: Standard 4.1.4.E., 4.1.4.F.
Students will use a kit developed by the Penn State Extension to master the science of how water moves and help to design a community where water moves into the ground, becoming a helpful resource instead of becoming a flood.
Watershed games: 4.2.4.A., 4.2.4.B., 4.5.4.C.
Students will be split into groups and rotate playing multiple watershed educational games: Defend your drain air hockey, Water Words Jenga, and Trash Hole to name a few.