EnviroScaping with SCOSAG

On June 29th, I had the chance to do an EnviroScape presentation for the South City Open Studio and Art Gallery (SCOSAG) summer camp. The EnviroScape Model is a small representation of a watershed; the River des Peres Watershed Coalition received ours from St. Louis’ Metropolitan Sewer District. It comes with cars, buildings (residential, industrial, and agricultural), bridges, trees, felt to represent grass and vegetation (and creatively a green roof system), and liquids and Kool-Aid packets that represents pollution. I have come to enjoy EnviroScape presentations because it is a great interactive way of spreading water awareness to children, and to really gauge their knowledge on water and environmental issues. I start off with introduction, then prompting questions such as: Why is water important? What is the water cycle and how water is interconnected? What is a watershed? Do you live near a creek or river? How long is the River des Peres? What are macro invertebrates? What creatures have you seen near your local water source? I asked about trash and pollution and other things that can negatively affect water quality and even the strangest thing that they have seen in a local waterway.
After my talk with the kids then the fun happens and things can get a little messy with the EnviroScape model. I have different ingredients to simulate various types of pollution. Red, Yellow, and Green packets of Kool-Aid represented pesticides, fertilizers, and metal pollution. The soy sauce represented Motor Oil, and table salt represented well you guess it… road salt. Like pollution in our everyday world, our simulated pollution had a powerful smell, though rather better than the River des Peres after a heavy rain; this really provided both a visual and olfactory aid for the kids in showing the effects of pollution on water.
We cleaned up our messy polluted environment, and I asked what ways could improve and reduce the effects of pollution; because I’m not all about doom and gloom, and focusing on the negatives. So I asked what practices can we all do to reduce the use of fertilizers and pesticides. They made suggestions such composting, proper yard/other waste disposal, and even green roofs. I chimed in with rain gardens and barrels, and the reduction of water use during heavy storms so as not to strain the Combined Sewer system and explained to kids how heavy storms, and storm water runoff can overflow into the River des Peres and other streams, which can negatively affect water quality and aquatic habitat. At the end of my presentation on water quality and protecting our local watershed, I asked the campers and counselors to sign and a keep their very own rain barrel. Because I can teach about water protection but making the means for them to do so easier can go a long way towards being a constant reminder. With their building being in Tower Grove Park a beautiful public park located in South Saint Louis, at a great location, maybe the barrel can be used as both an artistic conversation piece and generate more interest in rain barrels. While I can only post pictures to our blog without the children’s faces feel free to check out SCOSAG blog for more pictures http://scosagcamp.blogspot.com/.