Geography K–10 · Years 1–2
How much water does our school use in a day
Geography (HASS F–6 sub-strand); NSW Geography K–10 (2015) Stage 1 focus area: Features of Places (how places can be cared for); NSW HSIE K–6 (2024) Stage 1 geography outcome
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The idea
Water use can be measured in litres with a bucket and a timer, and a day's total for a place is the sum of many small uses.
Safety card
Hazards
- wet floor near the tap
- heavy ceramic cistern lid
Controls
- bucket filled outside or in a sink; floor mopped
- only an adult lifts or reads inside a cistern lid
Note
No chemicals or heat are used. The activity is run under the school risk-assessment procedure; RiskAssess (riskassess.com.au) holds templates for school practicals and fieldwork. The NSW Department of Education Chemical Safety in Schools package is not triggered.
What you need
- 1 bucket of at least 5 L marked at 1 L intervals (fill from the measuring jug to mark it)
- 1 stopwatch or phone timer
- 1 measuring jug, 1 L
- Tally sheet with columns: tap, bubbler, toilet flush, hand-wash
- Access to the school water meter (optional, with the office) for a start and end reading
How to do it
- Time how long a classroom tap, fully open, takes to fill the bucket to the 5 L mark. Repeat 3 times and take the middle time. Litres per minute = 5 × 60 ÷ seconds (for example, 25 s gives 12 L/min).
- Time three hand-washes with the tap running and record the seconds; litres per wash = flow (L/min) × seconds ÷ 60.
- An adult reads the litres per flush (full and half) printed on the toilet or inside the cistern lid; if no figure can be read, flushes are left out of the day total and the class records that they are missing.
- For one school day the class keeps a tally: each child adds a tick on the sheet by the door for each hand-wash and each flush.
- Multiply each tally by its litres and add the columns for the day total.
- If the office allows, read the school water meter at 9 am and 3 pm (kL) and compare with the class estimate.
What you should see
A day total in litres built from measured flows and counts. The litres per hand-wash come from the class's own bucket test: a measured flow of 12 L/min over a 20 s wash is 4.0 L, which the class compares with the guesses it wrote down before the bucket test, and the tally shows which use dominates the day. The meter comparison (1 kL = 1000 L) covers the whole site, including taps, kitchens, cleaning and any irrigation the class did not count, so it is normally the larger of the two figures; the class records both numbers and the difference rather than deciding in advance which way it will fall. It worked if each flow was measured three times and the middle value used.
What changes
- What you change
- type of water use
- What you measure
- litres per day
- What you keep the same
- same tap for the flow test
- timer started as the tap opens
Common misconceptions
Each of these ideas is wrong, and the activity is a chance to test it.
- A running tap uses only a cup or two while hands are washed.
- Water use cannot be measured without a meter.
Curriculum references
The NSW syllabus outcomes and Australian Curriculum v9 codes this activity supports. They are references, not a verified or complete curriculum alignment.
- Geography K–10 Syllabus (2015), NESA; current and taught in 2026, replaced from 2027. The outcome codes are not printed on the NESA landing page for this syllabus, which only links the document, so the url given is the syllabus document itself (geography-k-10-syllabus-2015.docx); the code and its outcome text were read in that document on 23 September 2026.GE1-2GE1-3
- Human Society and its Environment K–6 Syllabus (2024), NESA; implementation from 2027, not yet taught; code read on this page on 22 September 2026HS1-GEO-01
- Australian Curriculum v9AC9HS1K04AC9HS1S02AC9HS1S05
Sources
The pages the author read to write this activity.