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Classroom activity Grade 10 Health & Consumer Science

Harlow Crossing Boil-Water Advisory: A Household Response Game

A grade 10 simulation where student groups act as households during a fictional boil-water advisory, sorting water uses and evaluating the warning system.

Objectives

  1. Students will sort common household water uses by whether each needs boiled or bottled water during an advisory.
  2. Students will evaluate a boil-water advisory as a public-health tool with intended and unintended effects.

Vocabulary

Boil water advisory
A public notice telling people to boil tap water before drinking it because germs may have entered the pipes, often after a main break or a loss of pressure.

Also: potable water, waterborne illness, public health, cross-contamination

Teacher overview

This is a small-group decision simulation for groups of three or four. Each group acts as a household in the fictional town of Harlow Crossing on the day a boil-water advisory is issued after a water main break. Groups sort a deck of everyday water-use cards into what is safe with tap water and what needs boiled or bottled water, then answer questions about specific household tasks and evaluate why the advisory system exists. The sorting rules map directly onto the public-health guidance that real utilities issue during these events, so students practice the exact judgments a household actually faces.

Activity Directions

  1. Before class, print and cut one deck of water-use cards per group. The card list is printed at the top of the Student Handout, so a group can also write the twelve items onto index cards if that is easier. Print one Student Handout per student.
  2. Set the scene by reading the advisory aloud. In the fictional town of Harlow Crossing, a large main broke overnight, system pressure dropped, and the utility issued a boil-water advisory while it repairs the line, flushes the pipes, and tests the water for germs.
  3. Group students in threes or fours and give each group a full deck of cards.
  4. Round 1, sorting, about 10 minutes: each group sorts every card into three piles labeled "Boiled or bottled water," "Tap water is fine," and "Wait or use with care." Every member must be ready to defend a placement.
  5. Round 2, household tasks, about 12 minutes: using their sorted cards, groups answer questions 1 through 4 on the handout, deciding what each specific task requires.
  6. Round 3, evaluation, about 8 minutes: groups answer question 5, weighing the advisory as a public-health tool rather than only as a personal inconvenience.
  7. End the activity when every group has sorted all twelve cards and answered all five questions.
  8. Debrief by revealing the correct sorting one pile at a time so groups can check their piles. Close by asking which placements were hardest to agree on and why the reasoning mattered.
Harlow Crossing Boil-Water Advisory: A Household Response Game — Grade 10 Health & Consumer Science
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Handout

Your household lives in the fictional town of Harlow Crossing, which is under a boil-water advisory. Sort each card below into one of the three piles, then answer the questions.

Water-use cards: drinking a glass of water; brushing teeth; making infant formula; making ice cubes; washing hands with soap; flushing the toilet; taking a shower as an adult; bathing a toddler; washing dishes by hand; running a dishwasher with a hot sanitizing cycle; cooking pasta in boiling water; giving the dog its water bowl.

  1. A household needs water to make infant formula during the advisory. Should they use tap water or boiled or bottled water, and why?
  2. Someone needs to flush the toilet. Is ordinary tap water safe for this task during the advisory? Explain your reasoning.
  3. A person wants to brush their teeth. What water should they use, and why does the chance of swallowing matter here?
  4. A household wants to run its dishwasher. Under what condition are the dishes considered safe during a boil-water advisory?
  5. A boil-water advisory is meant to protect public health. Name one intended benefit of the advisory and one unintended burden it places on households.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Answer Key

Correct card sorting for the debrief reveal:

  • Boiled or bottled water: drinking a glass of water; brushing teeth; making infant formula; making ice cubes; giving the dog its water bowl.
  • Tap water is fine: flushing the toilet; washing hands with soap; taking a shower as an adult, without swallowing any water; cooking pasta in boiling water; running a dishwasher with a hot sanitizing cycle.
  • Wait or use with care: bathing a toddler, using a sponge bath with boiled or bottled water; washing dishes by hand, using a sanitizing rinse or boiled water.

Accept "Wait or use with care" for the adult shower as well, since the rule is to keep shower water out of the mouth.

  1. Answer: Boiled or bottled water.
    Infant formula should be mixed with boiled water that has cooled, or with bottled water, because infants are especially vulnerable and the formula is swallowed.
  2. Answer: Yes, tap water is fine.
    Flushing the toilet does not involve drinking the water, so ordinary tap water is safe for this use during the advisory.
  3. Answer: Boiled or bottled water.
    Teeth-brushing should use boiled or bottled water, because a person can swallow small amounts that could carry germs from the tap.
  4. Answer: Only with a hot sanitizing cycle.
    Machine dishwashing is safe only if the dishwasher has a hot sanitizing setting or a final rinse hot enough to disinfect; otherwise use bottled or boiled water or wait for the all-clear.
  5. Answer: One benefit and one burden, such as preventing illness versus added cost.
    The intended benefit is preventing waterborne illness while the safety of the supply is uncertain, and an unintended burden is the time, money, and effort of boiling or buying water, which falls hardest on households with the least slack in their budgets.

Differentiation

Support

Give these groups a sorting mat with the three pile labels already printed and one example card placed in each pile as a model. Allow them to answer questions 1 through 4 by circling "tap" or "boiled or bottled" and adding a short reason.

Extension

Ask groups to write the actual text of the all-clear message the utility would send two days later, explaining in plain language what was tested and why residents can return to normal tap use, and to note one thing a household should do before the next advisory.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "advisory," "boil," "sanitizing," and "swallow" with simple pictures before the sorting round. Allow students to place cards silently and point, and provide a sentence frame for question 5: "One benefit is ___. One burden is ___."