Every April for over 20 years the Sun Foundation’s Clean Water Celebration has brought thousands of students to the Peoria Civic Center to learn about our most valuable resource.
By Doug and Eileen Leunig
Most of us don’t. We take water for granted. Sure, drought in California, Colorado River drying up, headline-news thinking is everywhere and nonstop. But what do we really know about water? It is essential to all life yet we treat it like dirt. That needs to change, but how do we do that? How do we get everybody to think with intention about water? How can we teach people to love, appreciate, and respect our most valuable natural resource?
We met with Dr. LaToy Kennedy of District 150 with an idea about water and out of it has grown a multi-school, project-based learning opportunity.
Project-based learning gets students involved in actively exploring real-world problems and challenges. In the process, they acquire a deeper knowledge. Projects tend to be more open-ended than problem-based learning, giving students more choice when it comes to demonstrating what they know. Our approach is to get the kids involved in art projects that will help us answer that question: How do we get people to think about water?
The project results will be displayed and presented at the Sun Foundation’s Clean Water Celebration (CWC) April 20, 2015, at the Peoria Civic Center. The Clean Water Celebration is the largest clean water festival in the world and an outstanding environmental classroom that has brought over 35,000 kids to the Peoria Civic Center every April for over the past 20 years. Kids arrive with questions in hand to find answers embedded in the water booths, displays, and presentations.
Our upcoming work with District 150 isn’t the first time kids have been involved directly with CWC. Students at Washington Gifted School have created commercials for American Illinois Water company and CWC for years and staff the water company’s booth at CWC. We ourselves worked with kids at Washington Gifted for CWC a few ago as well as collaborating with Notre Dame’s art teacher Maggie Off and her senior level graphics design class.
We went to Ms. Off’s class as clients in need of a campaign about water. We gave the students some basic facts and they took it from there. The class created bumper stickers, advertising pieces, billboard mockups and even a video about the need to conserve and preserve our most vital resource. And a wonderful thing happened in the process. Ms. Off’s senior class started a plastic bottle recycling program and changed the world of Notre Dame.
Our approach is to challenge the kids to figure out how to change people’s thinking about water. In partnership with the District 150 teachers, we will guide them with expertise and let them apply 21st century skills of creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, and communication to focus attention on thinking about water. Students will use applied arts like photography, graphic design, and website design. The students of District 150 will be using a small amount of the art skills and a huge amount of creativity skills to get the word out. And we are certain they will be successful in getting people to think about water in a new light. We know this to be true because we know the power of expression in helping kids realize their creative potential. We’ve seen it work.
Why does it work? Art teaches children that small differences can have big effects. Case in point, the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. What started as one video ended up raising over $100,000,000 for the cause. Small difference. Big effect. Art also teaches children that problems can have more than one solution. This perfectly fits the need to get people to Think About Water.
The next time you reach to turn on the faucet, stop and think about what message you would share and then plan on coming to the Peoria Civic Center on April 20 to learn from another valuable resource – our kids.
