On Oct. 1-2, more than 850 Grade 4-6 students, with their teachers and parent volunteers, gathered at the Kinark Outdoor Centre to take part in the 19th annual Haliburton-Muskoka-Kawartha Children’s Water Festival, more than doubling last year’s participation.
Children engaged in hands-on fun at 36 activity-based learning stations set up across the site. Elementary schools from across the Trillium Lakelands District School Board and families of local homeschooling networks were involved.
More than 150 volunteers helped children explore the vital connections between water health, ecosystems, and personal and community well-being through motivational experiences.
The festival, a flagship program of the Haliburton-based charity FEEL (Friends of Ecological and Environmental Learning), is organized in partnership with U-Links Centre for Community-Based Research and the Kinark Outdoor Centre. Significant volunteer support came from high school students in the Kawartha Youth Leadership in Sustainability (YLS) program and Trent University students from the School of the Environment.
This year, 12 community partners, such as Turtle Guardians, Muskoka Watershed Council, TRACKS (TRent Aboriginal Cultural Knowledge and Science) and the Algonquin Highlands and Haliburton fire crews enriched the programming through their hands-on activities.
“Students soak in messages on water conservation, technology, protection and science and come to understand that their attitudes towards water matter and that their actions can and will make a difference,” coordinator Kara Mitchell said.
She added through the waterheroes.ca website, students can continue their water stewardship journey. Flowing from the festival until the end of April, students, as well as their families, friends and classmates, can enter the Big Splash contest by sending in water-friendly actions they pledge to do in the year ahead. Donated prizes will be awarded to individuals, classes and schools making inspiring positive impacts on local water systems through their ‘Water Hero’ actions, Mitchell added.
