World Water Day is March 22nd — a day when the world turns its attention towards the 750 million people who lack access to safe water. From these lines, I would like to contribute to raising awareness of the importance of this issue among our students.
The following video can be a nice starting point:
The British Council website offers a very complete range of activities that you can carry out after watching the video. You can access them here. You will find both on-line ("check for understanding: multiple choice and gap fil") and off-line activities ("worksheets and downloads").
Really moving stories that describe the drama millions of people are going through can be found on water.org. Since co-founded by Matt Damon and Gary White in in 1990, water.org has helped hundreds of communities in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean gain access to safe water and sanitation.
You can also make students listen to the following interview with Matt Damon about the water crisis in 2010:
A wide variety of resources is offered by the United Nations website. Logos and posters in many different languages can be downloaded from here.
Finally, a very practical ready-to-print lesson plan is offered, as usual, by ESL Holiday Lessons. You can work on this plan and students are bound to learn lots of language while they also get a glimpse of the crisis affecting one of the most precious resources we possess.