Big Ideas
In modern times, almost all of our water system infrastructure is out of sight. In our homes, we can see plumbing (pipes) under our sinks or in our basements if we look for them. Even though there is so much more to the system than what we can see, it helps us make the connection to what we can see as key to understanding what we cannot. Into the future — back to our phrase one more time– Out of sight…but maybe never out of mind.
Summary
All buildings are connected to our wastewater infrastructure. We learned in the previous lesson that this massive system of pipes conveys all the wastewater to our treatment plant where the solids are separated from the liquids, it is cleaned and disinfected and returned back to the river as an effluent cleaner than the river itself.
Engage
Slide 2: Review the urban water use cycle with students from the Schuylkill and Delaware Rivers as the source, to the Drinking Water Filtration process , and distribution to our homes for use. Remind them that once we use it, our wastewater leaves our houses, travels through another set of pipes to our Wastewater Treatment Plant, where is undergoes another physical, biological and chemical process before the cleaned up water is sent back to the rivers.
Slide 3: What do they notice and wonder about the whole cycle of water coming in to our houses and water leaving?
Did you ever think about this before we spent time in class learning about this?
How much do we see of the infrastructure of pipes and the process?
What can’t we ?
Discuss why this may be a good thing or not?
Explore and Explain
Slide 4-7: Students are going to draw/construct a model of a row house that will be used to show the pipe infrastructure in our houses.
There are two options:
- Create a template of a two-story house outline for students to use or
- Have students draw their own
A third option if tie allows or if an art teacher is able to collaborate, have students build a 3-d model using shoe boxes.
Distribute the water-using appliance stickers and ask them to glue them to the different rooms in their house.
Take a blank sheet of copy paper oriented vertically to make a simple drawing of a 2-story house with the front wall removed (like a doll house) so you can see what is inside. Students may need some examples to show them this “section” view perspective.
First, have students draw the rectangular outline of their house’s outer walls and divide it in half with a horizontal line to make two stories. They can add a vertical wall to make a bathroom on the second floor.
If you are using appliance stickers, they can be added once the rooms have been drawn.
On the first floor ask students to draw:
- Kitchen sink
- Washing machine or dishwasher
On the second floor ask students to delineate the bathroom wall and inside that room draw
- bathroom sink
- toilet
- shower or tub
Have students think about how to connect the plumbing so that water is available to come into the house to use the appliance, and how the wastewater will be sent out to the sewer system.
Have students draw the pipes showing how the water will travel into their house and then to their appliances (hint: vertically down the wall to the basement and then out to the street) This lets them see how the water inside is connected to a the water system outside.
Use BLUE for the drinking water connection
Use RED for the wastewater /drainage connection
Point out to students that under the streets, the wastewater pipes are always placed below (deeper than) the drinking water pipes
In this activity, students are exploring:
Where is the water coming from for us to use in our houses?
We know that water clean enough to consume (potable) first comes from the river and then from the drinking water filtration plant before being distributed to our homes
Where does the water go after we use it?
Elaborate
Slide 8: If they haven’t done so already, have students look around the classroom or the school to locate evidence of where water comes in and how it goes out of the building. They can look in the bathrooms, the lunch room, or even find a hydration station
If possible, compile the found evidence at your next class meeting.
The next time they are outside, see if there is any evidence outside (manhole covers provide access to the pipe!)
Teacher Support
Essential Question:
How has the development of our built environment impacted our natural environment?
Driving Questions:
Why do cities choose to create an underground infrastructure for wastewater?
What does our underground system look like? How do we know it’s there? How can water and people access that system?
Students will be able to:
Describe how infrastructure moves clean water comes in to our houses and how wastewater is removed.
Legal size paper to draw their row house model
Markers or crayons
Note: This can also be done using a shoebox if time allows
Use straws or string for pipes
Engineer noun
A person who designs, builds, or maintains engines, machines or public works
Manhole noun
A small covered upending in a floor, pavement, or other surface to allow a person to enter, especially an opening in a city street leading to a sewer
Runoff noun
The draining away of water (or substances carried in it) from the surface of an area of land, a building or structure, etc.
System noun
A set of connected things or parts forming a complex whole
Volume noun
The amount of space that a substance or object occupies
Wastewater noun
Water that has been used in washing, flushing, manufacturing, etc.: sewage
Infrastructure noun
1) The underlying foundation or basic framework (as of a system or organization) 2) The system of public works of a country, state or region
Students will describe their model of the infrastructure inside a residence that facilitates the urban water use cycle.
PA STEELS
3.4 Environmental Literacy and Sustainability
Sustainability and Stewardship3.4.6-8.G Obtain and communicate information to describe how best resource management practices and environmental laws are designed to achieve environmental sustainability.