Writing contest

I entered a writing contest from the Soil and Water Conservation and won 1st place in my school and Honorable Mention in County. The prompt for this essay was: This year's topic is "Water the Cycle of Life". 6th graders may choose to enter an essay about this prompt. Here is what I entered, hope you enjoy.

Water… the cycle of Life

Written By: Lynne Chen

  Did you know that about 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water? Without H2O humans would die. How? Well without water plants would die. Then humans would die because there would be no plants producing oxygen and without oxygen we cannot breathe. Basically plants can’t survive without rain.

So how does rain get to plants? Water travels in a cycle often called the hydrological cycle. There are many steps. This cycle has no starting point. I’ll start by talking about evaporation. This is the process when water from land turns into water vapor and floats into the air. The next step is condensation. Condensation is when gas or vapor turns into a liquid form including rain, snow, sleet, or hail. After both those steps precipitation happens. Precipitation is when any form of liquid falls from the sky.  The final step is runoff. Runoff is a process that happens after precipitation. When water flows off the surface and into rivers, oceans, lakes, or puddles it’s called a surface runoff.

 About 66% of the human body is made of just water. We drink, shower, swim, and cook with this incredible liquid source. Those are just a few examples that illustrate how water is used in our everyday life. The Earth is covered by a layer of water called the hydrosphere. The hydrosphere consists of all Earth’s water. Right now the hydrosphere is being damaged by pollution and trashed by litter. People are taking trash that they don’t want and throwing them into oceans and rivers. Many of the things living in the water have been killed because of this problem. Oceans that used to be beautiful and bursting with life are now deserted and filthy. We take one look at it and turn away at the sight of it. This is unfair since we’re the one who made it look that way. Not only are organisms living in the water harmed, but also the animals that drink the water. Because of this one problem it can lead to many others. For example, a river is trashed and the germs in it kill the fish swimming in the pond. Then a cow drinks out of the river. After that someone kills the cow for its meat. Then they sell the cow meat to a grocery store who sells it to us. When we eat the meat we are poisoned because the cow drank the water. If you start by poisoning water you could end up poisoning yourself.  

Close your eyes and imagine a pond covered in trash and oil. Not one ripple is in the water because nothing in it is alive. Humans are running out of clean water to drink. This is what will happen if we continue to treat water the way we are.

Don’t worry. There is still hope. You can start by gathering a group of people and going to a lake. You should take nets and gather trash floating in it. You can also write letters to a Water Conservation District asking them to help keep water clean. These are just some of the things you can do to help make a difference.    

Close your eyes again and imagine the same pond but this time it’s blue and bursting with life. Many animals and plants are in this pond. This is what can happen if we all lend a hand to help save the water and our planet. If everyone did their little part it could save the Earth as we know it.