Medlow Public School

Do Your Best

Telephone02 6564 2145

Emailmedlow-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au

Medlow Public School is on 'Water Watch'.

Medlow Public School children have spent the first five Monday mornings of Term 4 assessing, analysing and monitoring the section of river near the old Butter Factory as part of the Junior Waterwatch program. Working in groups, students have been drawing site maps, learning about river bank vegetation, assessing land use adjacent to the water way as well as doing scientific measurement and analysis of water quality, including temperature, turbidity, pH and water flow and studying the river's insect life (macroinvertebrates).

Under the watchful eye of Relieving Principal Sarah Landers, students walk the kilometre back to school, carefully collate their data and download their photos. When the program is completed, the school will have the opportunity to upload the data collected by the students to the Waterwatch online database. In this way, not only will the children have had a wonderful learning experience, but the information they collect will be a meaningful contribution to natural resource planning and monitoring around the state.

Relieving Principal Sarah Landers said, "The Junior Waterwatch program was a perfect fit for Medlow.  One of our strategic directions in our School Plan is Environmental Sustainability, and the program also fitted in well with our other units of work this year: Live Life Well in term one, animals in term two, plants in term three and water in term four. We will be repeating the Waterwatch program in Autumn to compare the results." Sarah also wanted to acknowledge the assistance of Tim Ryan from Landcare, who very generously donated a water testing kit to the school and local farmers Syd Scott and Dawn Smythe who assisted students onsite.

The Junior Waterwatch program has been supported and funded by all levels of government, including Catchment Management Authorities, the NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change and the Federal Government Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts.

 

Tim Ryan from Landcare presenting a water testing kit to one of our senior students, Lehman Laverty.