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Water Destination Relay

The city of Los Angeles sits within a semi-arid region of little rainfall. Los Angeles is so beautiful; it has attracted lots of people who make it their home. People use lots of water. Unfortunately, to make things worse, many people waste water by hosing their driveways instead of sweeping them, planting really thirsty plants, taking super-long showers, and letting the water run when they brush their teeth. Because of this, we must seek outside sources of water. The task is enormous and complex, because we are surrounded by ocean, mountains and desert. Not only does our water need to travel long distances, but it then must be distributed over a large area.

In Los Angeles, we receive our water from four sources. Fifteen percent of our water supply comes directly from local groundwater. The remainder comes via aqueducts from the Sacramento River (California Aqueduct), the Eastern Sierras (Owens River Aqueduct), and the Colorado River (Colorado River Aqueduct). After going through a filtration plant, the water is then distributed to homes and businesses by the City of Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

In a household, water can be classified by "inside" water use (sinks, toilets, showers, washing machines), and "outside" water use (hoses, sprinklers, spigots). Wastewater from inside use is carried out by underground sewer pipes that go to a wastewater treatment plant. There water goes through a process of separating solids from liquids. The liquids are treated before being reused or sent out to the ocean.

The outside wastewater is considered run-off, and is carried to the ocean by storm drains. It begins in the streets with gutters that channel the run-off. At the end of many gutters is a catch basin. These are the rectangular openings that collect water and debris from the street and carry them down into the storm drains. Storm drains, large tunnels under the street, carry the water and the debris to flood control channels, which then empty directly in the ocean. Unlike inside wastewater, outside run- off receives no treatment before entering the ocean.

OCEAN ALERT Though the storm drain system was designed to carry rainwater to the ocean, it carries much more. Anything on the ground that could wash into the streets, including litter, yard trimmings, grease, pesticides, animal droppings, smog, chemicals, paint, and motor oil, ends up in the catch basins and into the storm drains. The drains continually pour run-off directly onto the beach or within the surf line, resulting in high bacteria counts in the surf zone--an unhealthy situation for swimmers and marine life. Storm drain pollution is one of the largest threats to local bay water quality!

PREPARATION

1. Practice the visualization of water's journey to Los Angeles.
2. Prepare a tape of water sounds to play during the visualization (optional).
3. Prepare an area outside to play the Water Destination Relay. You may want to mark each spot, with masking tape.

MOTIVATOR

Tell the students, "We are going on an important urney. We are going on a water journey! When you have your eyes closed, you are to try to imagine the things you hear me describing."

Instruct the students to close their eyes and rest their heads on the tables or desks. Speaking softly and slowly, read the visualization (feel free to create your own or follow the one below, improvising as you go along). Turn on a tape playing water sounds (optional).

Imagine yourself as a tiny bit of dust up in a cloud high above the mountains.... water starts to form around you, is clinging to you, clinging until you feel so heavy that you just want to drop... As a tiny drop of rain, you fall, fall, fall to the earth.... As you approach, you see that below you is a forest of trees.... You fall onto a leaf, lying there briefly before sliding off and slowly rolling down the trunk to the ground. ... You seep down into the mulch, as it pulls you in like a sponge and seeping down into the warm soil, seeping down, down, down, you meet up with other water. drops forming pools of water under the ground.... As you keep flowing along, you meet up with an even bigger group of water drops and soon find yourself part of a stream, flowing along.... Coming out of the ground, you can see the sky and trees again as you move along very fast.... Suddenly you start moving faster, as you link up with a mighty river.... You have never seen so many of your water drop friends before, as you move along down, down, down, out of the mountains.... The river flows down until you are part of a large lake of water being held in by a dam--a wall that controls your flow... and as you move along happily in the sun, you realize that you and some of your friends are suddenly moving faster again, and before you know it, you are falling, falling, falling down a great waterfall... Before you know it, you are being sucked into a pipe that carries you to an aqueduct--a cement channel that will carry you all the way to Los Angeles!

PROCEDURE

1. Instruct students to open their eyes. Discuss the aqueduct system that brings water to Los Angeles. Show the aqueduct map (PDF).
2. "Once water arrives in Los Angeles, it is cleaned and then sent through pipes to our homes. We use it for many things. What are the different ways you use water inside your home? Record each answer on an index card."
3. "Let's see what happens to the water after we use it." Show Wastewater Treatment Map (PDF). Discuss how water from inside our home flows into pipes that go to a wastewater treatment plant and then to the ocean.
4. Show Storm Drain Map (PDF). Discuss how water outside our home flows down the gutter to the storm drains. "What are the different ways you use water outside your home?" Record each answer on an index card.
5. Explain to the students that they will be doing a relay to show the two water systems in our city that go to the ocean.
6. Divide the class into the following groups.
      Group #1:
         1 student represents the house pipe
         1 student represents the sewer pipe
         1 student represents the wastewater treatment plant
         1 student represents the sewer outfall
      Group #2:
         1 student represents the gutter
         1 student represents the catch basin
         1 student represents the storm drain pipe
         1 student represents the flood control channel
7. Arrange the groups as in figure 5. Put a bucket of water at the beginning of the relay to represent used water and an empty bucket at the end of the relay to represent the ocean. Hand each student along the relay a paper cup. Place a paper cup in the bucket of water at the beginning of the relay.
8. Give one of the index cards (with a water use) to each of the remaining students. Explain that they will walk up to the bucket of water, read out loud the water use on the 3 X 5 card and, using the cup, fill it with water out of the bucket and pour it into the cup of the correct water destination. Example: A child with "brushing teeth" would pour a cup of water into the "house pipe" cup.
9. Explain that the "house pipe" cup would then ran up to the "sewer pipe" cup and pour it into their cup. The relay would continue down the line pouring water from cup to cup until water is poured into the ocean bucket.
10. Rehearse each relay line.
11. Play the relay until all the index cards have been read.
12. Add bits of trash (plastic bag, six-pack soda ring) to the beginning bucket. Pour olive oil (to represent motor oil) and detergent (to represent washing a car) into the bucket also. Allow the relay to continue on the storm drain side. Observe the ocean bucket at the end of the relay.

ASSESSING THEIR LEARNING

Create a map that shows water's journey from inside and outside your home to the ocean (or street). "What effect do people have on the ocean?"

STRETCHING THEIR THINKING

• "How is it harmful to our water to put pollution into the wastewater treatment system?" (Harmful chemicals make their way into the food chain.)
• "What do you think we can do to minimize the amount of pollution in our water system?" (Recycle, don't litter, and make sure toxins are disposed of properly.)
• "What do you think we can do to conserve the water we use?" (Do not let water run when we are not actively using it; water plants in the evening when the sun is not out; cut down on overall use.)

OCEAN ALERT "How is pollution in the storm drains harmful to our ocean?" (It can cause serious health problems for people and animals, and wildlife can become entangled or choke in the trash.) "What kind of cleansers can we use that makes less of an impact on the earth?" (Substances such as vinegar, baking soda, biodegradable soap, hot water, or ammonia will work without harming the environment.)

THE NEXT STEP

Journal Activity
Have students write where our water comes from and where it goes.

WISDOM OF OUR TRADITION

The following is a teaching of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai, who lived long ago in the Land of Israel. He said:
"Three things are of equal importance: earth, humans and rain."
Why do you think that he chose those three. things? How are they related?

Rabbi Levi ben Hiyyata said:
"...to teach that without earth, there is no rain, and without rain, the earth cannot endure, and without either, humans cannot exist."
Explain each part of Levi ben Hiyyata's answer as you understand it.

The classic Torah commentator Rashi also thought about this relationship when he explained the order of the creation of the earth:
"The Bible states: 'The earth brought forth vegetation; seed-bearing plants of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it' (Genesis 1:12).
"And then later in the second chapter of Genesis, it states: 'When no shrub of the field was yet on the earth and no grasses of the field had yet sprouted, because the Lord God had not sent rain upon the earth and there was no man to till the soil' (Genesis 2:5)."
On this contradiction, Rashi explains: "And what is the reason that He did not make it rain? Because there was no man to work the earth and there was no one to recognize the benefits of rain. And when Adam came and recognized that they were necessary for the world, he prayed for them and they descended and the trees and grass sprouted."

Questions
Are Rabbi Levi ben Hiyyata and Rashi saying the same thing? Where do they differ, if at all?
According to Rashi's explanation, is having water to sustain the world an automatic thing?
What does he suggest that our attitude toward it be?
How does this tie in with the idea of keeping our water clean? Write your own midrash for the twentieth century, based on any of the above texts.