St. Mary's
Rivers

Good morning, my name is Harley and I’m Katie.
We are representing St Mary’s Primary School. For our topic we focused on the importance of clean rivers.

We began our Geography topic, Investigating Rivers, in early September.

We soon learnt how important water is to life. Not only to humans but also to wildlife. When Ieuan came to visit us he told us more about the recent World Summit in Johannesburg in August. Here World leaders together with many others met to discuss important issues. One of the key issues was the importance of clean water.

After some discussion we came up with a hypothesis. This was that Year 6 believe the River Thames is polluted.

A week later, we made a visit to the foreshore near Hammersmith Bridge. But in order to get there we had to pass by lots of rubbish such as plastic, wood and paper left when the river was at high tide.

We made our way down to the foreshore where we immediately found examples of life when we lifted some stones, and found there were lots of small snails.

We then began our river dipping. All groups were successful in finding and collecting animals. These included freshwater shrimps and leeches. These showed that the River Thames is quite clean. But why does it look dirty?

We also collected water samples, which we took back to class.
Within a few minutes of our return the water settled. The mud and silt was now at the bottom of the jar.

We also made a pH test using litmus paper. It indicated an unpolluted river. Our hypothesis was wrong.

Two weeks later we visited the Urban Studies Centre where 3 visitors had been invited to meet with us.

Chris Coode was from a group called Thames 21. They organise groups to clear rubbish from the Thames.

We also met Mike from Friends of the Earth. They are a group who make life better for people and wildlife alike.

The 3rd person was Dido Berkeley who is a member of Thamesbank, an organisation involved in many issues associated with the Thames.

Dido also explained how it is important to prevent too many buildings being built close to the river. It would be nice to live or work next to the river, but it destroys habitats and can affect food chains. All Year 6 pupils know all about food webs.
(Yes they’re nodding).

We felt particularly proud that there are people such as these who take the time and trouble to help the environment in which we all live or work.

Our own borough too, Hammersmith and Fulham, is actively involved in promoting and developing the river. The Thames is now the cleanest metropolitan estuary in Europe.

In order to find more about the efforts of other groups in the world we made contact with Rohit Joshi. He is a project coordinator working in Varanasi, a city of over a million people alongside the Ganges.

The Indian name for the Ganges is the Ganga. It is the Holy River for the Hindus. Pilgrims and visitors go to the river to bathe and make offerings. Although it is a holy river it has been abused and waste and pollution pour into it. A massive clean up campaign began in 1985, but there are still hundreds of kilometres that are heavily polluted.

Rohit Joshi works for the Clean Ganga campaign and we found out from him by e-mail what he and others are trying to do. He is working with schools and groups to clear rubbish from the rivers. In addition he is working with other groups who then interact with local communities to spread the word about how they can help improve the quality of their river.

What Next?
Well we have a number of ideas we want to follow.

In addition to studying the river we conducted a survey of passers by. Of the people who were interviewed 70% were local residents. People were there for a range of reasons but mainly because it’s a quiet, relaxing and pretty place. However the one problem people mentioned, over 75%, was the litter and the rubbish in the river. We want to investigate this more.

We also want to speak with our P.C. Mark. We think a clean river scenario in our Junior Citizens event would be a good idea.

We would also like more people to know about the water quality levels. Perhaps in HFM, or displayed on the Borough’s indicator board. We are going to be writing to local papers and the radio. We feel that there should be a weekly announcement giving water quality. It will acknowledge people’s efforts and inform others. There are thousands of people already doing so.

On behalf of Year 6 we would like to thank all those who helped and advised our class especially Ieuan, Sue and Sav. We have really appreciated everyone’s time, interest and encouragement.

Thank you and remember rubbish and river pollution affects everyone and everything.