Niagara Children’s Water Festival to run next week

Niagara Water Festival Photo credit: Niagara Region

Niagara Region will host the 18th annual Niagara Children’s Water Festival, its second virtual festival starting next week.

The event run in partnership with the City of St. Catharines, Ontario Power Generation, Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority, and Brock University runs May 10-14, 2021.

The Niagara Children’s Water Festival is designed for Grade 3 and 4 students from all municipalities across Niagara, It educates students about the importance of “our most valuable natural resource: water,” said a news advisory from the Region.

It said the goal of the festival is to develop future decision-makers by empowering children to initiate behaviour change within their homes, schools and communities.

Building on the virtual festival concept initiated last year, the five-day educational festival includes a week’s worth of unique online videos, virtual tours, web activities, and live interactive workshops hosted by professionals in the fields of water treatment, science, engineering, and conservation.

This year’s virtual version of the festival is designed to allow teachers to choose the activities they wish to experience with their students based on their class’s learning objectives and remote learning schedule.

The Niagara Children’s Water Festival first moved to a virtual format last year when the in-person festival had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 2020 virtual festival saw 1,128 unique online visitors.  As of Wednesday, 237 teachers were registered to participate equalling an estimated 5,344 students to be in virtual attendance.  Teachers can register for the festival until May 7.

The festival website is at: https://www.niagararegion.ca/waterfestival/virtual/default.aspx

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