While most adults understand the value and importance of clean drinking water, many children take it for granted and believe that clean, pure drinking water will come from the tap and/or from bottles today, tomorrow and always.

In their world, the words ‘pollution’ and ‘contamination’ happen in other places and not in THEIR own neighborhoods or in the sources of their drinking water. The naive nature of children makes them precious at times, yes, but we, as responsible adults, have a duty to teach them about the importance of making sure their drinking water IS safe today and will be safe tomorrow.

Since no one really wants to try and explain the concept of titrations and so forth to young kids, companies such as WaterSafe and Industrial Test Systems, Inc. have developed simple, easy-to-use drinking water test kits which make teaching children about water quality as easy as dipping a test strip and comparing colors on a chart.

Industrial Test Systems, Inc. has excellent, and quite comprehensive, test strip based drinking water test kits that even a child could use without much effort:

• Water Quality Test Kit — Test for 15 different water quality parameters. Contains (2) two tests for free chlorine, total chlorine, chloride, pH, total alkalinity, total hardness, nitrate, nitrite, iron, sulfate, hydrogen sulfide, and copper. Also contains (1) test for lead, pesticides (atrazine & simazine), and bacteria.
• Well Water Check — 2 test for each: pH, Total Alkalinity, Total Hardness, Iron & Nitrate/Nitrite Nitrogen.

We found two sizes of WaterSafe Science Projects for water quality readily available:

• WaterSafe Science Project — Contains (4) four tests for lead, bacteria, pesticides, nitrates, nitrites, chlorine, hardness and pH.
• WaterSafe Science Project — Contains (10) ten tests for lead, bacteria, pesticides, nitrates, nitrites, chlorine, hardness and pH.

Drinking water testing: A necessary skill for today’s youth!