Lakeland PBS presents Common Ground, brought to you by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

Production funding of Common Ground is made possible in part by First National Bank Bemidji, continuing their 2nd century of service to the community, member FDIC [Music] [Music] Welcome to Common Ground.

I'm producer/ director Scott Knudson.

In this 1st episode of a 2-part series, visit Grand Rapids, Minnesota, for the 5th grade Water Summit.

There, students learn from teachers and other educators the importance and power of water.

[Music] [Music] Let's get started.

If you would, please, accept our welcome of coming today.

We would sincerely appreciate that.

We can't do this event without students, and we think we have a pretty good day lined up for you.

And we hope that you learn a whole bunch of information that you've never heard about before.

And, if you would be so kind, is when you get done with the day to share some of the information that you learned about today with somebody that might be interested in hearing about what you found out during this wonderful, sunny day.

And, without saying much more, I would like to introduce to you Patty Jo Irvin, and she's going to do our opening ceremony.

My name is Patty Irvin and I am from here, Grand Rapids.

And I'm otter clan, and I see my clan.

I see my people out there.

Otter clan, where are you?

Alright.

Water is life!

Water is life!

Say it with me.

Water is life!

Water is life.

Please remember this when you go home today.

Carry that message with you for the rest of your lives.

Water is life.

I'm going to sing a couple of songs, water songs, for you.

The 1st one is from the Huron Nation, and I'm just gonna sing 1 verse, so you could get a little bit of an idea of the different kinds of water songs we sing when we are honoring the water.

And the the Huron words translate to, "Water, you are beautiful."

[Music] The Youth Water Summit is a place where 5th graders from all over the county come and learn about water in its many uses and the issues and the benefits that come with our water system here in Grand Rapids.

And the reason that we began this particular educational program at Itasca Waters is to help with some of the curriculum at the 5th grade level and also just to get a direct line to 5th grade students, because they have a lot of energy and many times they're willing to do things that, you know, a 7th or 8th grader has decided is not cool any longer.

So that means, you know, maybe touching a critter or touching an aquatic invertebrate.

Well, we're learning about how to keep the waters clean and just trying to make sure that we don't do anything that makes it contaminated, you know.

A 5th grader, they're really interested in things like this.

It doesn't matter if they're boys or girls.

We wanted to reach that age group of kids because we think that that is the way to try to get our message and our mission with Itasca Waters moving through the Itasca County area.

Because these schools are not just Grand Rapids students.

The Water Summit pulls not only students from locally in Grand Rapids but also, you know, much broader in the surrounding areas as well.

So this year what we ended up having was we had ISD 318, which is Grand Rapids.

My name is Carl Myers and I'm a 5th grade teacher here at West Rapids Elementary.

Each year, I really enjoy bringing my class to the Youth Water Summit here for Itasca County.

Hi, my name is Gus Jackson and I go to East Rapids Elementary, and today we're going to learn about how to keep our lakes and water sources clean.

I'm Rachel Newman.

I am a local educator here in Grand Rapids.

I'm a volunteer presenter at the Itasca Youth Water Summit.

I have been doing it for 3 years.

We had District 316 which is the Coleraine-Nashwauk School District.

I believe it's Nashwauk, Pengilly.

And we also had the Big Fork students come down.

We had St. Joseph's Catholic School.

My name is Claire Riley.

I go to St. Joseph's School and today we are learning about water and why it is so important.

It's very exciting.

It's very fast-paced, which is something that they really enjoy when they get there.

The time flies.

It's very exciting.

They get a chance to interact with community members who work in areas where they're concerned with water quality, in our county and beyond.

So David Lick is the lead coordinator.

He's responsible for doing the behind the scenes work to make this whole day possible.

David Lick is just a firecracker of a person.

He is such a great coordinator.

I have fun volunteering with him.

Okay, I'm David Lick.

I organized the Youth Water Summit approximately 9 years ago, actually it's 11 years ago, but we lost a couple years due to COVID.

And we just completed our last Youth Water Summit on the 24th of May of this year, so throughout the day those kids arrive at the fairgrounds, around 9:00 in the morning, and then the event begins.

The program is set up so that we have very small groups.

So usually we don't like to have more than 10 or 11 students in a group.

And those students are broken up by their teachers in the classroom by the type of a type of animal.

Like, we've got 11 or 12 otters.

We've got some maple trees.

We've got some crappies.

We've got some sunfish.

And then what happens is they travel with that group throughout the day and they move every 30 minutes between presentations that are done by these pretty expert presenters.

Even the turtles in there just don't get warm enough.

It's about 4 degrees warmer in this spot than it was in the main.

So originally, when we started organizing this, you know, 11 years ago, the idea was to try to find presenters who could do hands-on things with kids not having anything in their hands.

And all they would do is go through the presentations throughout the day and listen to what's being presented, and then do something with it.

Like, for instance, you know, some of the presenters have a lot of activities going on.

They're running.

They're touching.

They're tagging.

They're kayaking.

They're doing active things.

Does anybody know how many lakes we have in Itasca County?

What did you say?

1,000?

You're really close, 1,007.

Why would we wear life jackets?

So if you fall you don't drown.

Yep.

What about this time of year?

It's cold.

It's cold.

Cold.

Cold kills, guys.

It can cause you to do all kinds of different things that you wouldn't normally do if the water was warm.

What's it making Mary do?

Go forward.

Okay, what if I push back?

Then that's backwards.

It's a backward stroke.

And what is she doing?

Going backwards.

But what else did it do when she first started it?

It slowed her down.

So you can use it as a slowdown and a break.

It also helps for turning.

Alrighty, so I'm going to give you some real brief instructions.

So I'm sure you were watching a little bit.

gonna actually have you grab on the paddle here.

You're going to want to hold on to the paddle about where your shoulders are at, like width apart, so right where you got your hands right now is perfect.

Another thing you're going to want to watch for is, you see how there's lettering on this side and if you flip it over there's no letters on that side?

So what you're going to want to do is make sure that the letters are facing you, so that way you know that you're paddling with the right side of the paddle.

I thought the most fun of all the activities I did was the kayaking.

It was really fun to kayak with my friends, and we learned about the water cycle.

We did this bracelet thing where we had these bracelets, and you would put a bead on it for, like, every spot that water goes through and you would see how a water droplet could do their water cycle.

And you know what else is really interesting about the event and the day is that we combine the older age group of people, like citizens that are willing to help out that day and also the presenters that are, some of them are two generations older, you know?

One of my students every year would always say, "I don't need a calculator.

I got my phone!"

"Okay, I'll grab my phone.

I'll go to Google Maps.

What the heck!

They don't have any coverage.

I'm lost!"

We've got the answer for you.

It never runs out of batteries.

It never goes dead.

It doesn't need satellites and it's accurate, accurate as can be.

This is called a ranger compass.

It's used by natural resource professors.

There's a varied group of people that come to do presentations at the Youth Water Summit.

We've got retired Wildlife biologists.

A lot of the presenters are retired teachers, and we all know how good teachers are with getting messages across.

We've got 7th grade teachers that now help with microscope identification.

Northerns, you guys are looking microorganisms that live in the swamps and lakes and ponds that are around us.

It looks like it has like a clear layer.

It's still there.

It's in the middle.

Lydia, move.

You've already seen it.

We've got actual teachers that are there that take the day off.

We're able to pay for their subs so they can come work our day.

Okay, so you guys, what we're making right now is called a base, and so we're looking at like differences in PH.

And you guys are making a base.

In your graduated cylinder is an acid and that's why it's red.

So now what I want you guys to take is take one of these pipettes.

So let's take one of these little dropper things and I want you to grab your graduated cylinder, press this down all the way, like try to get it into your fingers.

Press it down all the way, suck up some of the stuff from your little beaker, some of the sodium carbonate solution you just made, and then I want you to squirt it as fast as you can and then watch what happens in the sunlight.

Pull yours up.

Yours is layered.

Grab a little vinegar for hers and just put like a couple little drops of vinegar on the top.

You can see, like, all the different colors.

So if you want to take a little bit of vinegar, pass it down, and then just kind of let it settle out.

Don't stir it up.

Oh, wow.

So the idea of the entire day is about water science, and that is a little bit broad because this year we had a group that came up and they taught how to portage a canoe.

You got it!

Trust it.

You got it!

It's just finding its balance.

You got to take a couple steps forward.

Nice!

Nice job.

Yes, guys!

When the canoe was on your shoulders was anything a little different?

Yeah, lighter.

Lighter than you expected?

That's a good thing.

What else?

It's kind of like squatting.

It is kind of like squatting, for Oh my god!

You're so great.

I mean it's not water science but it's about water and getting kids to explore the outdoors.

We had a session on how to prepare for a camping trip.

We had sessions about identifying water vegetation that's in the lake.

We have people that could go down to the lake.

There's a lake near where we do this event, and the kids could actually go down there and see some of the vegetation that grows in that littoral zone, that shallow area around the interface of the of the beach.

This stuff produces a lot of oxygen.

It also takes up a lot of nutrients in a lake, instead of algae, so it's actually good that this stuff is in the lake.

This is probably the largest Potamogetan.

That's called Large Leaf Pondweed.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find any with new leaves on yet.

And basically, you know, to these kids, a weed's a weed.

But the idea is just to get them introduced to the fact of what those weeds do and what their job is in that environment.

Okay, well, it's a Curly Leaf Pondweed.

It's an invasive species and so it grows, unlike the rest of these plants that kind of grow as a community, this can overtake the vegetation of a lake.

It can cause a lot of problems with the habitat.

It is controlled.

It has these crinkly leaves on the end and it emerges quite early.

I'm an Itasca County master gardener.

I have a deep love of growing things.

Produce, specifically, for our local community.

And that love of plants connected me with the founder of Itasca Waters, Dave Lick, and his wife Susan.

And I present with Susan about how plants use water.

Dandelions not only are the first food for all those good pollinators that we have, especially up north, they feed a lot of things that we need, they also.

Alrighty.

Yeah, you shove that one in the ground right next to that little guy.

And, again, this one, it's just concrete or pavement that we're looking at over here.

Okay?

Because all of the water immediately runs off and it goes straight to a big water body like that, so the plants can use those chemicals and nutrients that are in those in that topsoil.

So that is very important because that's the inch of soil that carries or holds all of our nutrients.

So our plants could uptake that and all of our organic material that's all held up in the top inch or 2 of topsoil.

So we want to try to keep that and not have it be carried off with the water.

As it goes, kind of watch what's happening, and you kind of watch that backboard too and see if anything is happening.

What do you think that wheat straw is doing on this one?

At least, it's kind of like temporary cover.

At least, it's slowing those water droplets down.

It's just kind of what your rivers and lakes are.

This is where the water, when you have water run off, it's going directly into these jars in the front.

The funniest part was probably the speeches because I think my friends really liked that because I swear everybody was laughing.

Yeah, come back up here.

Alright.

And then why don't you come up here too?

Yep, yep.

So we got lift and we got wind.

Alright, oh this will work out great.

If you go to your friend and you say, "You know what?

I've been spinning like this all day.

I'm bored.

I don't know what to do."

You got warm air coming from one direction.

Cold air coming from another direction and, lift, you're going up.

Right?

You turn her this way.

What did you just turn her into?

A tornado!

A tornado.

Alright, bend your knees and we're gonna practice this motion.

We're gonna watch this form a tornado in that bottle.

Ready?

There you go.

Okay, now I want you to turn this over like this and do that motion.

You'll get a tornado in here.

Yeah.

Holy violence.

We've got people from Sea Grant that come.

We've got people from Friends of the Boundary Waters that come.

We've got the Let's Take a Senior Fishing.

We use their pontoon boat to do Secchi disk readings.

We've got people from RMB Labs that's a laboratory that does water analysis.

We've got them to go on the pontoon boat.

So, I'm Steve.

And I guess I didn't tell you guys much.

I grew up on a lake down by Alexandria.

Steve Henry is a employee of RMB Labs and he is our person that goes on the pontoon boat.

Martin Flicker is the captain of the Let's Take a Senior Fishing and what he does is he has Rich Newstead as his mate.

The 3 of those guys go out on the pontoon boat with 12 students and they do Secchi disk readings.

I learned about the Secchi disk out on the pontoon.

We got to--they dropped it down into the water and we got to see how far down it went.

But it was very brightly colored.

When we couldn't see it anymore, then we stopped and we pulled it up and see how many notches we had.

And that was the water clarity.

We're going to have you guys go ahead and measure clarity today.

And you're going to unravel your disk and you're going to keep track as you lower it down, nice and slow, and you're going to want to lower this down until it just disappears, and then figure out how far down it is.

And then, we're going to have you lower it down a little further, and you pull it back up and measure again where it disappears.

So this is telling us about how much much stuff is coming into the lake.

The algae is eating it and can give us a pretty good idea of how much food comes into your lake each year.

Maybe, if you're in my area and water comes from miles, there's other sources that you really need to key in on.

But in Itasca County, we like to keep the woods and keep stuff on the shoreline, and that's really the keys to keeping our lakes healthy for future generations.

It's important to share that information and to get involved and do what you can.

Like Rich says, you know, not throwing line into a lake and bottles and things of that nature.

When you do see something, go out of your way to pick it up, good thing to do.

Jeff Cook has helped us out.

He does a thing on dams because he's the dam tender for the U.S Army Corps of Engineers.

And he comes to the program and has ever since it originated.

And he talks to kids about, you know, why they have to dam up water and do what they do about controlling reservoirs.

Hi my name is Jeff Cook.

I'm a Parker Ranger with the US Army Corps of Engineers, based out of here in Grand Rapids at the Pokegama Dam.

I'm here today at the Itasca County Youth Water Summit Day, and today I brought with me my model of a low head dam.

These dams are based all across the country and on small rivers and creeks, creating a watering hole for cattle or irrigation for farmers.

This here is simulating my low head dam, and what I'm showing is this hydraulic roller effect that gets created.

So as the water pool comes up it flows over the top of the dam and it comes down, kind of like this waterfall looking deal here, and it creates this roller.

And what I'm showing today, why I bring it out to these students, is showing how it how hard it is to get out of these rollers if you fall in.

You know, I have a simulated green army men so they float just like everybody else.

They're wearing their life jacket today, but as you get in too close, you can watch these guys get pulled in and wrapped around in this hydraulic roller.

They're really dangerous.

These dams have the nickname of a drowning machine because you get stuck in that roller and you're not coming out.

I've only been talking for maybe 15 seconds here and he still is in there rolling around.

He's got his life jacket on, so he pops back up to the top of the water.

That water has so much force in it.

It grabs them again and pulls them right back under.

And we like to show that, you know, even though it's your best friend, your mom, dad, your brother, or sister, you go in trying to get them out of there you're getting pulled right back in.

And now I have two victims to try to save.

These are extremely dangerous.

They take lives of people every single day, all throughout the year, unfortunately.

So I like to bring this around.

I get to bring it to something like today and reach up to 500 students today and teach them the dangers of these low head dams.

We have people who have an interest in something like for instance, Sam Guida.

Sam Guida comes to do this because he's got a varied interest in some of these science concepts and he's good at explaining.

Hi there.

My name is Sam Guida.

Right now we're at the place where I'm living and working.

This is Camp Olson YMCA.

I'm the new facilities director and maintenance manager here, and we're down by our staging area.

And right in the back here we've got Vikings Point on Little Boy Lake.

And, basically, what Sam does is he does a water cloud at the fairgrounds for us, during that day, and he's dynamic and the kids love to see stuff like that happen.

Oh, the kids really, really love to come and see it, especially when you're walking up you're not quite sure what it is because there's this weird contraption on the table, and it's bright red and bright blue, and then it's got like a bicycle pump going into it.

And so it looks kind of, you know, like, mad sciency.

And they all come up, and we did a little bit of an intro, and so they're like, "Alright, this is kind of weird.

We're not jumping right into, like, what we're doing."

And then as they got closer they got to, you know, touch and feel everything.

And so, quickly, they change from like a little bit of like trepidation or confusion through being more and more involved and getting more excited.

Really big pumps, nice and slow, and then let's all count together as we get 10 big pumps.

So all the way up, until you pull it up as high as it can go, and then back down.

And you can just do it as high as you can go.

You can take all the ingredients, similar to baking a cake or, you know, making cookies, and you use the kids knowledge about what they already know as well as you, like, help them to get there until they answer the questions.

And they like slowly build all of the ingredients that you need to make a cloud, and then you put everything together, and you do a little demonstration, and you end up creating this really cool cloud in a bottle.

And it's really exciting and mind-blowing for the kids because you get to, you know, be physically part of creating this really cool science experiment.

But it also creates a lot of, like, long-term memories related to what goes into building a cloud and, like, the water system, related to that.

I'm gonna release this in a second and it's gonna make a loud noise and I want you to watch the top of the chamber here and see what happens.

You ready?

What do you see is coming out of our chamber?

Not smoke.

It's a cloud.

I have a cloud in a bottle.

And so, can I see that cork again?

We're gonna add a little bit of pressure back in, so the hot air and the cold air stop mixing.

What do you think will happen when they stop mixing?

It'll blow up!

It'll blow up?

And then because they got to physically help put together the clouds and, you know, they got to like answer questions and blurt things out, they all got really more and more invested.

And then, by the end, you have this like really big poof when you remove the cork and it pulls the hot and cold air together.

And you, all of a sudden, see their faces like light up in excitement when this like misty cloud starts rising out of the bottle.

And it's really cool to see their excitement and, like, be involved in it.

And they all were really about it, and often they wanted to do you know a 2nd or a 3rd cloud.

And then they wanted to look around and see what clouds are going on around them and try to figure out what caused all of those.

It's white.

But is it still white in there?

No.

What color is it?

It's see-through again.

Alright, are you ready?

I'm gonna let it go once more.

It turns white because we have our cloud again.

These students come back engaged with what they learned.

They're ver,y very ready and primed to use what they learned during this one day event, in the classroom.

We got to learn about the Boundary Waters, so I think a lot of those things will stick with me.

The safety tips that they gave us, I will probably remember that for a long time.

I mean, it's just nice to live in Minnesota because of all the green and trees and, I mean, it would just be terrible if the water--if I couldn't swim anymore because the water is messed up.

When I get home, I'm going to tell my parents that I love kayaking, and it was so much fun learning about the water cycle.

If you learn this stuff, you can help take care of the water and help keep our planets nice.

The 5th graders who are coming to the next Water Summit should wear hats and comfy shoes.

They should get a good night's sleep and eat a great breakfast because they are in for a day of fun and excitement.

I hope they come ready to hear new information, and they should ask questions because these are people who care about their learning.

And there is no dumb question.

Ask questions.

Be curious and come prepared.

Wear some sunscreen.

Thanks for watching.

Join us again for part 2 on Common Ground.

If you have an idea for Common Ground in north-central Minnesota, email us at legacy@lptv.org or call 218-333-3014.

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Common Ground is brought to you by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund with money by the vote of the people, November 4th, 2008.

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