Try the oil spill clean-up challenge

You’ll need

Four clear plastic bowls or containers
Water
Wooden spoon
Four jugs
Plastic toy sea creatures
Rocks or pebbles
Blue food colouring
Vegetable oil
Cocoa powder
Cotton balls
Paper cups
Newspaper
Sponges
Tissues
Spoons
Kitchen roll

Before you begin

Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. There's also more guidance to help you carry out your risk assessment, including examples.
Make sure you’ll have enough adult helpers. You may need some parents and carers to help if you’re short on helpers.
Remember to give a safety briefing for the cooking equipment and methods you’re using. You may wish to demonstrate the methods or activity before you all start cooking.

Planning and setting up this activity

Remember to check for any allergies, then adjust the activity materials as appropriate. Always speak to the person, as well as their parent or carer if relevant, to find out what's best. Make sure to keep all the food packaging or ingredient lists, so that it can be shared with them if needed. You may also wish to provide ingredients lists prior to cooking activities or residential events for people to check.

Running this activity

Ask everyone what water pollution is. Water pollution happens when rubbish, chemicals, or other harmful things get into lakes, rivers, oceans, or ponds. This can make the water dirty and unsafe for animals, plants, and even people.
Tell everyone that the biggest cause of water pollution is often from sewage and wastewater treatment. Other causes of water pollution can be rubbish being dumped in water, farming and oil spills.
Explain that you’ll be looking at oil spills. An oil spill happens when oil accidentally leaks into the sea. This can happen because of mistakes or accidents, such as when a ship carrying oil breaks or if an oil rig in the sea has a problem and oil spills out. Oil spills can harm sea creatures and plants, and if the oil gets into the food chain, it can also be dangerous for humans.
Fill four clear plastic containers halfway with water and add two drops of blue food colouring into each, then mix them with the spoon.
Let the group create ocean habitats using the rocks and toy ocean animals, then add a toy boat to each one.
Mix the oil and cocoa powder to create the crude oil, then divide it equally into 4 jugs.
Let someone empty the oil mix onto each boat to simulate a tanker carrying crude oil across the ocean. Tip the boats over, so the oil spills into the water. Oh no, the water’s polluted!
Now, the challenge is to clean it up. Show everyone what tools they must try to clean it up. For example, spoons, kitchen or toilet rolls, newspapers, paper cups, cotton wool balls, sponges and tissues.
Let everyone guess which tool they think is going to do the best job removing oil from the water. Everyone should get into groups dependent on which tool they think will work best.
Each group should try to remove the oil with their tool.
Set a timer for five minutes and see which group manages to remove the most ‘oil’.
At the end, gather everyone back together and see which material worked best. Now, ask people to think about how they’d clean up an oil spill in the sea or in an ocean, and how they would clean up any animals or wildlife too.

- Explain that when oil spills into the ocean, special teams work to clean it up. They use big boats with special equipment to help. Sometimes, they use 'booms’, which are floating barriers, to stop the oil from spreading. Then, they use ‘skimmers’ to scoop the oil off the water’s surface. Other times, they use special chemicals to break the oil into tiny pieces so it’s easier to clean. It takes a lot of work to clean up an oil spill and protect sea animals and plants. Some sea animals, like fish, birds, and turtles, might get sick from the oil if they touch it or try to eat it. Birds can get oil on their feathers, which makes it hard for them to fly or stay warm. It can take a long time for the ocean and all the animals to get better after an oil spill.

Reflection

This activity was all about learning about water pollution and what causes it, such as oil spills. What do we need water for? We recreated an oil spill. What was it like? What was easy and what was harder or frustrating? How did you find working as a team? How did it go? What did the oil feel like? Did it stick together or spread out?

You had to try to clean up an oil spill. Did you clean up a lot of the oil? Which tool worked best? How do you think oil spills are cleaned up in the sea or in an ocean? Would it be hard to do?

If water is polluted, it can also impact the animals or wildlife that’s there. How easy do you think it would be to clean animals that are covered in oil? What happens if humans or animals drink water that’s been polluted with oil or something else? How can we stop water pollution? What do you think should happen if someone does pollute water or a company spills oil into water, even if it’s an accident?

Safety

All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.

Outdoor activities: You must have permission to use the location. Always check the weather forecast, and inform parents and carers of any change in venue.
Visits away from your meeting place: Complete a thorough risk assessment and include hazards, such as roads, woodland, plants, animals, and bodies of water (for example, rivers, ponds, lakes, and seas). You’ll probably need more adult helpers than usual. Your risk assessment should include how many adults you need. The young people to adult ratios are a minimum requirement. When you do your risk assessment, you might decide that you need more adults than the ratio specifies. Think about extra equipment that you may need to take with you, such as high visibility clothing, a first aid kit, water, and waterproofs. Throughout the activity, watch out for changes in the weather and do regular headcounts.
Near water: Manage groups carefully when near water. The guidance on activities near water will help you to keep your group safe.
Chemicals: This task involves the use of potentially harmful fluids or chemicals. Make sure you follow all relevant safety guidance. Make sure you dispose of them appropriately too, in line with safety guidance.
Craft: Unusual substances: Supervise young people appropriately when they’re using unusual substances, such as powdered paint, ash or dirt. Be aware of any medical conditions that could be affected by what’s being used. Make sure you follow all relevant safety guidance or manufacturers guidelines, where available. Make sure you dispose of it appropriately too, in line with safety guidance.
Science: Supervise young people, and only do science activities that are advised and age appropriate for your section. Test activities first, to make sure you’re confident you can lead them safely. Use protective clothing where necessary.