On September 28, 40 students from Mason Pilot Elementary School visited Northeastern University for a field trip on pollution and sustainability. In the morning, the students learned about sources of water pollution and ways to detect and combat the effects of it with water filters. They read a story about the development of pollution in the Charles River over time, and took turns dumping containers of “pollutants” into a bin of water to represent the river. The students then designed and created water filters that were used to filter the polluted water. The success of the water filters were analyzed by the appearance of the water filtered through them.
- A group of students “fish” with tools that they purchased using money earned in previous rounds.
- A team of students guides their teammate as he attempts to “fish” with his eyes closed (to represent a power outage on the fishing boat).
In the afternoon, the students focused on the reasoning behind over-fishing, and the possible long-term impact it may have on the environment. They did an activity to represent several competing fishing industries struggling to be successful without depleting their available population of fish.