As part of the Middle School Unit inquiry this term, students have been looking at world or community problems and thinking about possible solutions to help overcome them. We have been following the “6 Ds” for this process which asks students to Define, Discover, Dream, Design, Deliver and Debrief the problem they chose to investigate.
We have seen some creative and powerful ideas coming from these sessions. One group was investigating the problem of water pollution. As part of their solution they chose to write a blog post to educate others about the issue. I’m sure they would love a comment or two on what they wrote!

Water pollution

Water pollution is the contamination of water often caused by humans. We would like to help this and hopefully you can help too.

About one garbage truck of plastic gets into the ocean per minute. One million sea birds are killed each year by plastics and one hundred thousand marine mammals are also killed each year. 
At least 8 million tons of plastic enter the oceans each year. That’s similar to emptying a garbage truck of plastic into an ocean every minute.

There is more micro-plastic in the ocean than there are stars in the Milky Way

The eight most common types of garbage found in the ocean are:
Plastic bottles 
Plastic bags 
Cigarettes
Food wrappers 
Plastic utensils 
Straws
Beverage cans
Paper bags.

If you would like to help water pollution here are some things you can do:

Run the dishwasher and washing machine only when you have a full load 
Do not flush pills liquid or powder medication down the toilet
Have separate bins for recycling and waste
Recycle all things recycle able 
Use a minimum amount of dishwashing liquid

Thank you for reading, and remember if you ever see rubbish on the ground, please pick it up!

Matilda R, Lauren A, Lara N, Zoe S, Ivy V-D