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I am looking for good activities for 8th grade students, dealing with groundwater.

Hi Evelyn and welcome to the discussion threads! Eighth graders love the SEPUP kits. For groundwater, I have used the Fruitvale kit: Groundwater Contamination: Trouble in Fruitvale. You can access information about it at the SEPUP website. The kits are a bit pricey, but they can be used year after year once you purchase one. You can create a unit that may be only a week long or up to 6 weeks depending on how much you use the SEPUP teacher's manual. There have been a couple of other discussion threads about the water cycle and groundwater that you might find useful to peruse. One of the threads is called Water Water Everywhere..., and the other is called Watershed Activities. A lot of great resources are mentioned in those two threads. I hope this helps get you started. I know others will chime in with additional ideas.
Carolyn

I just found a link in another forum posting that has a lot of information about groundwater. Here it is.....http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/mearthgw.html It is from the USGS website.

Here is a kinesthetic activity from the USGS: https://www.co.jefferson.co.us/jeffco/planning_uploads/water_ed/raindrops_classroom_act.pdf

Discovery Education also has great resources; check the link http://www.discoveryeducation.com/?ErrMsg=Your%20session%20has%20expired%2C%20please%20login&returnURL=app%2Ediscoveryeducation%2Ecom%2Fsearch

A couple sites I like for secondary students are located at the USGS and the EPA.
The USGS site is more geared to more of the physical relationships encountered in the water cycle, and the EPA site has lots of activities related to water quality and public health. Both have many resources.

http://education.usgs.gov/secondary.html#groundwater
http://water.epa.gov/learn/resources/index.cfm

I just found out about the Sustainable Water Challenge by the Green Education Foundation. You might be interested: http://www.greeneducationfoundation.org/sustainable-water-challenge.html?utm_source=Weekly+NGW+Bulletin+for+Members+-+Water+Challenge&utm_campaign=1.23.13%3A+NGW+Weekly+Notice+to+Mayors&utm_medium=email

There are a couple activities in the Project WET guide that demonstrates the movement of groundwater, and helps students identify and correct misconceptions about groundwater movement and point source pollution. One involves creating an aquifer in a cakepan, and watching the movement of 'pollution' (kool-aid). This one could easily be adapted to an inquiry curriculum by having students design the experiment, and making materials other than sand.

The other is more of a puzzle to find the point source of arsenic poisoning. Clues are provided, and students study concentration gradients to find possible sources. You could extend the activity to have students design a testing plan much like a hydrologist would in order to study the flow.

Both activities are available in the Project WET book. I think the second is 'A Grave Mistake.' They are identified for secondary grades, but can be adapted for earlier grades.

A couple others that I have used are 'Branching Out' in which students construct a watershed model, and 'Incredible Journey' which is an activity that demonstrates movement of water through the water cycle. These can be adapted to secondary classrooms easily as well.

More information can be found at Project WET's website: http://projectwet.org/