Ripple Effect of Learning Sara Damon | Stillwater Junior High School, Stillwater, MN
My passion as a geography teacher lies in helping students learn to use not only their geographic heads, but also their geographic hearts and hands. I use these four questions to frame my instruction:
Where is it?
Why is it there?
What difference does it make? and most importantly,
What can we do about it?
For the past seven years, I’ve led my geography students and our broader school community in a service learning partnership with H2O for Life, resulting in powerful geography learning opportunities focused on culture, migration and refugees and $71,000 raised by our school to fund eight clean water wells in South Sudan drilled by the nongovernmental organization Water For South Sudan.
The professional challenge that inspired this fellowship application was my desire to refresh and renew this H2O for Life service learning curriculum.
My fellowship allowed me to see the powerful impact of H2O for Life firsthand by visiting seven Kenyan schools that have received funds from to implement school WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) projects. I was able to meet administrators, teachers and students that have been personally impacted by the fact that they now have clean water and toilets at school. I was able to see and hear about the health, economic and educational effects of access or lack of access to improved water and sanitation in the school setting as well as in urban and rural home settings. I now have compelling stories and images to share with my students, staff and school community as testament to how “water changes everything.” When school started in September, I piloted with my five AP Human Geography classes a new curriculum I wrote called “Ripple Effects: The Impact Of Water and Sanitation On Standard of Living.” A component of this curriculum is a Story Map, summarizing experiences and insights gained through my fellowship in Kenya. At the educator level, I will be sharing the new curriculum with school colleagues and with fellow educators through the H2O for Life teacher network, through the University of Minnesota Institute for Global Studies Africa in the Classroom initiative and at Global Education Forum 2016 in Philadelphia.
Based on this learning experience we kicked off this year’s H2O For Life-Water For South Sudan service learning project with a Walk For Water on September 24th. At the Walk For Water, students, staff, parents and community members walk 15 laps on the school track carrying 2 gallons of water to simulate the walk for water that many in the world make on a daily basis. Participants seek sponsors and raise funds. Building on the walk experience, this year’s H2O For Life-Water For South Sudan Student Leadership Team will be formed. These volunteer student leaders set awareness and fundraising goals, brainstormed ideas and planned and will implement service learning activities throughout the school year in collaboration with school and community partners. Through our H2O For Life-Water For South Sudan project, students not only gain significant content knowledge about the global water crisis, they gain confidence in their ability to use their time, effort, talents, voices and power in numbers to change the world. I am confident that this refreshed, improved and enhanced H2O For Life service learning project will provide students with the knowledge and motivation to continue to work locally and globally to improve access to water, sanitation and education and most importantly, to translate awareness into action on whatever issues they discover they are most passionate about.
What I was able to see, hear and reflect upon as a result of the Fund for Teachers fellowship in Kenya has allowed me to create new teaching content and to share in a compelling way the real life impact of H2O for Life WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) projects as I reinvigorate my own desire to continue the hard work of motivating my geography students and the school community to translate geographic awareness into geographic action.
Water DOES change everything. WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) in schools has myriad positive ripple effects that contribute to improved health and educational attainment, especially for girls.
You can follow the impact of Sara’s students on the Stillwater Junior High School H2O for Life Facebook page.