Ground Truth Studies Teacher Handbook - Aspen Global Change ...

Your Watershed’s Story
Objectives
Students will be able to: 1) devise and carry out interviews
within the community; 2) name several natural and
human activities that have changed the local watershed in
living history; 3) describe the interaction between the
river, its quality and the lives of people in the watershed.
Method
Students will design a questionnaire, interview local
people, and compile the oral histories collected to
establish the recent history of a river and its watershed.
Students must have a firm grasp of the meaning of
watershed in order to be able to interview other people.
Background
Anthropologists and ethnographers use interviewing as a
research technique to collect oral histories: accounts of
places and events that are not written, but passed on from
one generation to the next verbally. Oral histories are
usually the re-telling of the personal, daily lives of
ordinary people, in their own words. Collecting oral
histories provides students with an exciting way to forge
links with people of various ages and to accumulate the
wisdom of experience. The purpose of this activity is for
students to gain an appreciation for the rich information
contained in oral histories, and the complex ways in
which watershed changes affect people’s lives. Learners
more easily establish the connections between events and
the context in which they occur because interviewing
makes history more personal.
Materials
Writing materials, tape recorders, blank tapes, aerial or
satellite images, topographic maps or watershed model of
the local watershed.
Age
Grades 7 - 12
Subjects
Social Studies, Sociology, Anthropology,
Science, Language Arts
Duration
At least two class periods plus time outside of
class for conducting interviews
Skills
compiling information, designing
questionnaires, interviewing
Key Vocabulary
anthropology, ethnography, meander, oral
history, political boundary, raw materials, value
judgement
Procedure
1. To prepare to interview older members of the
community to find out what various parts of the
watershed were like in years gone by, divide the
learners into small groups to generate questions to be
asked during interviews. Compile all questions
suggested. As a large group, decide which questions
to place on a questionnaire to insure that a minimum
standard of similar information is sought with each
interview. Interview questions might include:
• How long have you lived in the area?
• What were the river and the surrounding
watershed like when you were my age?
• What are the different uses of the river that you
have witnessed?
© ASPEN GLOBAL CHANGE INSTITUTE 1995 GROUND TRUTH STUDIES
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