Grade 11 Lesson plan
Wystan Gorge and the New Deal Dams: Hydropower Trade-Offs
A grade 11 science and history lesson on why the New Deal built giant dams, how hydropower works, and the cost-benefit trade-offs of a fictional dam proposal.
NGSS · High School (9–12)
HS-ESS3-1 Explain how resource availability has shaped human activity
Construct an explanation based on evidence for how the availability of natural resources, occurrence of natural hazards, and changes in climate have influenced human activity.
Clarification statement: Examples of key natural resources include access to fresh water (such as rivers, lakes, and groundwater), regions of fertile soils such as river deltas, and high concentrations of minerals and fossil fuels. Examples of natural hazards can be from interior processes (such as volcanic eruptions and earthquakes), surface processes (such as tsunamis, mass wasting and soil erosion), and severe weather (such as hurricanes, floods, and droughts). Examples of the results of changes in climate that can affect populations or drive mass migrations include changes to sea level, regional patterns of temperature and precipitation, and the types of crops and livestock that can be raised.
Why water teaches this standard well
Access to fresh water from rivers, lakes, and groundwater is the clarification's leading example of a resource that shapes where and how people live. Students can explain why cities grew beside water, why droughts drove migrations, and why water availability still drives economic and political decisions today.
Materials tagged with this code are written to the full standard , including its clarification statement , and each carries a written note explaining the alignment. See how we review materials.
24 materials aligned to HS-ESS3-1
Lesson plans
Grade 12 Lesson plan
Darcy's Law and the Merrifield Aquifer
A 50-minute grade 12 lesson using Darcy's law to compute groundwater flow, seepage velocity, and contaminant travel time for a fictional town's confined aquifer.
Grade 9 Lesson plan
Tiered Water Rates in Braemoor: A Grade 9 Conservation Lesson
A 50-minute grade 9 lesson where students compute household bills under an increasing-block water rate and analyze how tiered pricing rewards conservation.
Grade 10 Lesson plan
Hollow Pine River: Streamflow Data and Earth-System Feedbacks
A grade 10 lesson where students analyze streamflow and sediment data around a fictional dammed river to identify Earth-system feedbacks and write a claim.
Grade 9 Lesson plan
Alder Mesa's Shrinking Aquifer: Modeling Groundwater Drawdown
A grade 9 Earth science lesson using aquifer storage change to write a linear equation projecting when a fictional town's water table hits a critical level.
Worksheets
Grade 10 Worksheet
Quarnwood Landfill Plume: Travel Time in the Dellwick Aquifer
Grade 10 students use monitoring well data to find a hydraulic gradient, calculate seepage velocity, and estimate how long a landfill plume needs to reach a well field.
Grade 12 Worksheet
Flood Frequency and Culvert Sizing on Tullimore Creek
A grade 12 science worksheet using 20 years of peak-flow records to rank floods, find return periods and exceedance risk, and size a replacement culvert.
Math problem sets
Grade 10 Math problem set
Ashford Reservoir Water Budget: Acre-Feet and Days of Supply
A grade 10 problem set at the fictional Ashford Reservoir, building a drought water budget in acre-feet and solving an equation for the days until a critical low level.
Grade 12 Math problem set
Mid-Section Gauging on the Denbrook and a Withdrawal Limit
A grade 12 science problem set in which students compute stream discharge from nine measured verticals, then test a town's intake against two permit conditions.
Grade 9 Math problem set
Fallowmere's River Intake: From Stream Flow to Plant Capacity
A grade 9 problem set converting river flow among cfs, MGD, and gpm at a fictional town's intake, then testing a withdrawal limit against summer low flow.
Grade 9 Math problem set
Pinehaven Well: Drawdown, Specific Capacity, and Safe Yield
A grade 9 problem set where students use a fictional town well's water levels to find drawdown and specific capacity, then set up equations for safe pumping yield.
Labs & experiments
Grade 11 Lab / experiment
Pentland Aquifer Materials: Porosity and Specific Yield Lab
A grade 11 lab measuring the porosity and specific yield of gravel, sand, and fine soil to compare how well each fictional aquifer material stores and releases water.
Reading passages
Grade 10 Reading passage
Why the Yarncombe Valley Sinks in Every Dry Year
A grade 10 science reading passage on land subsidence in a farming valley, with benchmark survey data and questions on clay compaction and the pumping feedback loop.
Grade 12 Reading passage
Sinking Ground in the Sowerby Valley
A grade 12 science passage and data table on how groundwater pumping compacts clay layers, sinks the land surface, and reshapes farming in a fictional valley.
Grade 9 Reading passage
Water From Beside the River: Riddlesworth's Collector Wells
A grade 9 science reading passage on riverbank filtration, in which a fictional town stops pumping from the river and draws water through the sand beside it.
Grade 10 Reading passage
Cleaning Water to Drink Again: The Science of Potable Reuse
A grade 10 reading passage on potable water reuse, tracing the microfiltration, reverse osmosis, and UV barriers that turn treated wastewater into drinking water.
Grade 11 Reading passage
Storing Winter Water Underground: Havenridge's Recharge Wells
A grade 11 passage on aquifer storage and recovery in a fictional city, paired with an injection and recovery table covering efficiency, well clogging, and chemistry.
Grade 11 Reading passage
Quillon Valley's Sinking Ground: Overdraft and Subsidence
A grade 11 science passage on a fictional valley where groundwater overdraft during drought caused permanent land subsidence, with literal and inferential questions.
Grade 12 Reading passage
Earth's Water Budget and Residence Time
A grade 12 science reading passage on how Earth's water is distributed and how residence time explains why slow reservoirs like deep groundwater are hard to protect.
Grade 9 Reading passage
Old Water: Residence Time and the Cypress Bench Aquifer
A grade 9 science passage on how fast water moves through parts of the water cycle, and why a town that depends on a slow-recharging aquifer must plan for the long term.
Writing prompts
Grade 11 Writing prompt
Why Tanbury Springs Declined: Rainfall, Pumping, or Pines
Grade 11 students weigh three explanations for an 18-year decline in a fictional spring, then write an evidence-based argument with a counterclaim and a proposed test.
Projects
Grade 12 Project
Aquifer Storage and Recovery for the Lattimore Basin
A grade 12 science capstone in which students test whether winter surplus water can be stored underground, then defend a recommendation to a fictional agency board.
Quizzes & test questions
Grade 9 Quiz & test questions
Cindermill's Next Water Source: Supply Gap, Reuse, and Cost per MGD
A 40-point grade 9 quiz on a fictional city's water supply gap, mixing multiple choice, computation, and short answer across reuse, wells, energy, and cost per MGD.
Grade 9 Quiz & test questions
Water Cycle and Watersheds: A Grade 9 Earth Systems Test
A 25-point grade 9 assessment on the water cycle and watersheds, mixing multiple-choice, short-answer, and one runoff computation item on Earth's connected systems.