Students read one of two articles (the "cases") from High Country News, …
Students read one of two articles (the "cases") from High Country News, a bi-weekly periodical that covers environmental issues in the western North America. Both articles are about situations in which the use of ground water by irrigators has decreased the amount of surface water available for users with senior water rights. I divide the class into groups representing 1) surface water users, 2) ground water users, and 3) a regulatory board. The groups read and discuss each article and prepare a case to present to the regulatory board. After each group has prepared their case, we gather for a hearing, where groups of consultants present their cases and are questioned by the regulatory board. At the end, the regulatory board makes "decisions" on each "case". The decision isn't the focus of the exercise. The most valuable part is the subsequent discussion about the cases and the common issues in them that get the students to recognize the connection between surface and ground water and how humans have come up with confusing and sometimes scientifically conflicting sets of laws to regulate each.
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In this exercise, students predict changes in the movement of a dissolved …
In this exercise, students predict changes in the movement of a dissolved plume in response to remedial pumping in an unconfined aquifer. The underlying conceptual model for the distribution of aquifer and aquitard materials is not known with certainty. Consequently, two alternative end-member conceptualizations are presented to students who are then asked to hypothesize differences in predicted responses at the pumping wells and nearby monitoring wells for each conceptual model. Predictions are compared to actual field data, and students discover that contaminant concentration measurements depend not only on the location of the observation point (in three dimensions), but also on the length of the screened interval through which water samples are collected. The activity is divided into three parts: (1) site/problem description, (2) formulation and testing of hypotheses for pumping wells, and (3) formulation and testing of hypotheses for monitoring wells. The activity gives students practice in three dimensional thinking and reinforces their intuitive understanding of contaminant plume migration in response to natural gradients and engineered stresses.
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In this exercise, we use the USGS real-time data available online, and …
In this exercise, we use the USGS real-time data available online, and use it to construct a rating curve for the Walla Walla river near Touchet. We then make a simple model of flood inundation in ArcGIS for the area around our gaging station.
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Students work in groups to develop posters that communicate their concept of …
Students work in groups to develop posters that communicate their concept of landscape following several field labs (soils, sediment analysis, river discharge, vegetation survey, aquatic life) at one location. They must consider four categories: landscape interactions, landscape history, life, and perspectives/communication.
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