Lets Get Our River Back

TEXT 7: LETS GET OUR RIVER BACK!

A. ORIENTATION Work with a partner. Discuss these questions. 1. Do you have a river, lake, or other body of water in or near your town? 2. If so, is it clean? 3. Would you like to swim in it? 4. What causes river pollution? 5. What can be done about it? B. READ THE PASSAGE BELOW. THEN ANSWER THE QUESTIONS THAT FOLLOW.

Working Hand in Hand to Clean Up Brantas River In the past, the Brantas River, which runs through Malang, provided thousands of people with their daily water needs. In those days, people used the water from the river for drinking, cooking, and washing. Previously, people also used to throw household waste into the river without causing much harm. The waste was mostly organic (plant of animal material) and so was biodegradable (the plants and animal material is broken and is absorbed into the environment). For example, goods that people bought in the market were wrapped in banana leaf, which quickly rotted away. In the 1950s, however, plastic was introduced to wrap goods: plastic does not disappear quickly, and it is a toxic (poisonous) substance. There were now many items in household bins that were dangerous to the environment. At the same time, factories and industries appeared, and these caused serious problems, as they dumped their waste in the river. At first, people didnt notice that there was anything wrong. The river usually carried away all the garbage and people forgot about it. But then the amount of garbage increased with the population and the increase of factories and the river became blocked in places. Blockages were often due to metal and plastic items which did not rot away. This meant that the garbage stayed in the same place and the water became polluted. It became unsafe to drink the water and it was also unpleasant to be near the river as it stank from all the rotting garbage.

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Lets Get Our River Back

People began to grumble about the Brantas Rivers condition. Everyone was aware of the situation, and so when the Malang municipal authorities set up a campaign to clean up the river, the residents were keen to be actively involved. After all, gotong royong, or community service, is part of Indonesian tradition. The municipal government chose the day and invited all to take part. On that day, 30,000 residents of Malang turned up to participate. It was a wonderful thing to see old and young, men and women, army personnel and students working together hand-in-hand on this environmental project. Their faces were full of joy and camaraderie: differences of race, age, rank, and religion were set aside. Nothing stopped them from taking part, not even slippery roads, the bad smell of the water, heavy rain, or the heat of the sun: they were determined to get the job done. Even though each person cleaned just a small part of the river, the collective effort of all those people succeeded in cleaning up the river. Nobody could take a drink of water from it, and it took some time before fish lived in it again, but the community had taken a vital step. Each person after that day looked at the river with pride; it belonged to each one of them and each had taken care of it. They knew that they had to continue to take care of it to make sure the coming generations could enjoy the Brantas River.

C. CONTENT FOCUS 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. What is the reading passage about? What is the difference between the days before and after the 1950s? Why did dumping garbage in the river later become a problem? Why do you think the people enjoyed their work on the river? Was the campaign a success? If so, why, and if not, why not?

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Lets Get Our River Back

D. LANGUAGE FOCUS 1. List the past tense verbs in the first four paragraphs of the text. 2. You have listed all the verbs in the simple past tense. Now look at the irregular verbs and complete the table below with the two forms of each verb, present simple and past simple. The first one has been done for you. Present simple tense Provide, provides Past simple tense Add -d only: provided

3. Read the following passage to find out what the students on Malang Campus did to help the environment. Put each verbs in parentheses into the simple past tense. When you have finished, check your answers with a partner.

The Brantas River clean-up 1. _________________ (is not) the only environmental project in Malang at that time. universities active part many years ago. Some of the students 3. _____________ (set up) environmental organizations such as the Students Envirinmental Club. The stuedents in each campus 4. _______ (give) their own name to their club. They 5. _____________ (get) members from amongst the students and teachers. The students in the clubs soon 6. __________ (become) very active in promoting peoples awareness. They 7. _____________ (begin) with the campus itself. They 8. _________ (think) of activities to make people more aware of nature; they also 9. ________ (want) people to enjoy nature. These activities 10. _______ (include) mountaineering, bird watching, clean water campaigns, and forest preservation. But this 11. ________ (is) just the beginning. Students now need to go outside the campus and make their communities more aware of their responsibility for their environment. With a positive attitude, we can all make a clean environment a reality, and not just a dream. Students at the 2. ____________ (start) to be interested in taking an

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Lets Get Our River Back

E. TAKE PART Choose one of the following three projects: 1. Organize a small play or performance for your community. You will need to collect many different items of garbage (plastic bags, tin cans, boxes, paper, etc) to get impact for your massage. Use the garbage with the actors to show what happen when too much rubbish builds up. Scene II could show how the actors dispose of rubbish in a responsible way. Invite people from the municipal authorities to watch. Talk to your group about ideas for an environmental cleanup day in your area. It need not be a river, it could be, for example, a piece of empty land where people dump garbage Check with the authorities that they are agreeable to this. Inform the public with flyers (pieces of paper distributed to the public) and public talks. Ask other groups or classes for help if you need a lot of people to manage the campaign. One way that we can protect the earths water is by using less water. Did you know that although the basic human need for water I about 50 liters (13.2 gallons) per day, human sage of water in countries such as the U.S. is closer to 500 liters (132.1 gallons) per day? Do an audit of your water use. Here is a questionnaire you can adapt for your own use.

2.

3.

a. Do you turn off the tap while brushing your teeth? If you do not, you use about 18 liters of water. b. Do you take a shower or a bath? Showers use less water. c. When you shower, do you leave the water running all the time, or do you shut off the water when you do not need it? The best way is to use a scoop or bucket to throw water on yourself. In Indonesia, this is called mandi which in fact uses less water than taking a shower or a bath. d. Do you collect rainwater to use for washing and other purposes? e. Do you fix leaking toilets and faucets in sinks? f. Do you have a water-saving toilet in your home? A regular toilet uses about 20-25 liters every time you flush. The best way is to not use a flush toilet. g. Do you use a bowl to wash vegetab;les and fruit, instead of washing them in water from the tap? h. Do you do anything to save water? If so, what do you do? 4. Work with two or three classmates to develop your own questionnaire. Do the questionnaire about your own water use and compare results. Then, use the questionnaire with people outside your class. Based on your findings, teach people how they can save water. You can use brochures, posters, plays, or other ways of teaching. Check to see if you have used commas correct.

English For Science and Technology

Lets Get Our River Back

English For Science and Technology