Month: November 2025

Run Off With Water Knowledge

Supplies

• 3 clear plastic cups labeled A,B, and C
• 4 empty clear plastic cups
• Soil
• Water
• Rocks
• Leaves

Procedure

1.  Have Cups A, B, and  C with about 6-7 small holes at the bottom 
2. Pour Cup A with half a cup of soil and measure half a cup of water in an empty plastic cup. 
3. Pour the half cup of water into Cup A and place a cup underneath for the runoff water to be collected.
4. In Cup B pour half a cup of soil, but mix in about a handful of leaves within the soil. Pour half a cup of water into Cup B and collect the runoff into an empty cup.
5. In Cup C pour half a cup of soil and mix in about 4 rocks within the soil. Pour half a cup of water into Cup B and collect the runoff into an empty cup.
6. Observe the 3 cups with the collected runoff and compare amount, color, and particles.

Conclusion

• Observations between runoffs
• Recall quiz questions

Tips

• Prepare holes with cups beforehand.
• May be difficult to do with big groups 6+ due to distractions
• Have lots of paper towels laid on the table/ tablecloth.

Kennelly, Stephanie. “Watershed: Exploring Run-Off and Infiltration in the Classroom.” MnSTEP Teaching Activity Collection, Garlough Environmental Magnet School, West Saint Paul, MN, 7 Aug. 2008, serc.carleton.edu/sp/mnstep/activities/26051.html.

I ended up narrowing down my lesson plan to focus on water run off, this also brings the idea of infiltration into play. Students were provided with 3 cups. Cup A contained clean water. The water was then poured into Cup B. Cup B contained soil on top and one other object at the bottom (such as leaves and rocks). Cup B and the object both contained a hole at the bottom. The water was then poured into Cup B from Cup A’s runoff water ran into Cup C. The students observed the amount of water in Cup C and the color of the water in Cup C. A few things I noticed from the kids during the lessons, is that they were very engaged and curious about how water was flowing out of the cup. They loved seeing how much water came out and measuring the soil along with pouring the water. The fact that this activity was very interactive got the kids excited and curious. 

There were a few things that I would work on better such as one of the rotations I had a bigger group than usual, about half of the kids maintained engagement while a few began to have their own conversations. I tried speaking a little bit louder, but it did not really work for that long. What I did in this situation was ask if they wanted to do the next step such as measure the soil, or pour out the water. This was the most efficient way that I could think of that brought them back to staying engaged in the lesson. 

Another thing that I began to notice was at the end when we had a minute left, I began to quiz the students regarding the vocabulary that we learned. For example, I pointed to cup C which contained the excess water run off from cup A, and I asked them “what’s this water called?”, and they were able to recall the word run off. This is why it is crucial to annotate and use vocabulary words while conducting the experiment and then use active recall, to make sure the students understood the lesson. Overall, I heavily enjoyed conducting this lesson to the students at JJK; it was a really valuable experience and I am glad that the kids loved it too.