On the occasion of the IX Science Week, IMDEA Foundation’s facilities hosted the workshop “make your own aquifer”, aiming to show the participants how the groundwater flows. Organised by IMDEA and researchers from the Rey Juan Carlos University, sponsored by AIG EUROPE and with the collaboration of Consolider TRAGUA (INGENIO-2010 Program), the event was attended by students in the 3rd year of Compulsory Secondary Education, who were taught about the main factors affecting groundwater, both theoretical and in practice.

With the purpose of assessing the students’ previous ideas on groundwater, the workshop started with a brief test encompassing basic concepts and whose purpose was to evaluate their previous knowledge in the field. Following the test, the workshop commenced, being divided into 3 parts of 50 minutes in total. A brief presentation aimed to introduce the students to the topic, awakening their curiosity and transmitting the reality of groundwater to them (storage, catchment techniques, groundwater overexploitation, economic interests, etc.). The students understood the concept that groundwater composition is not random and that it can be polluted.

A detritic aquifer model was built on recyclable material, representing the water cycle and focusing on groundwater. Precipitation and infiltration phenomena were shown, together with groundwater movement. They were taught about water flow movements in the subsoil (saturated and unsaturated areas). Furthermore, an individual multi-material aquifer enabled the students to analyse different porosities.

“It has been great, I never thought an aquifer could store that much water and that it could flow through porous material”, a student in the 3rd year of Compulsory Secondary Education commented. Virtudes Martínez, IMDEA Water researcher and workshop responsible, highlighted the importance of scientific transfer within the youth sector.

Both teachers and students were clearly satisfied and promised to come back to the centre if similar activities took place in the future. Given the continuous workshops information requests by primary and secondary education teaching staff, IMDEA Water has undertaken a scientific dissemination project towards this sector, which will shortly be uploaded onto the web-site.