③ Transfer · Solve the problem

Phase 3 — Meet the problem

⛔ Gate check: only open this phase once students have finished Surface and Deep. This is where they transfer everything they built into a real, messy decision.

This is Problem-Based Learning. Students don't answer questions about rivers — they step inside the problem as stakeholders in the region, and the teacher guides rather than tells. The whole phase runs the problem-solving process named in §113.18(c)(22)(B).

Problem-solving teaching · d 0.61§113.18(c)(5), (c)(22)(B)

Step 1 · Meet the Problem

Read the narrative aloud. Read it once for the story, then again for details students will need.

One great river gives life to three neighboring countries. It rises in the highlands of Highland, winds through the crowded cities of Midland, and spreads across the farms of Rivermouth before it reaches the sea. For as long as anyone can remember, the river has been enough.

But the region has changed. There are far more people now, and each country needs more water. Highland is finishing a tall new dam that will make electricity for its people — but to fill it, the dam must hold back part of the river. Midland's biggest city is doubling in size and needs clean drinking water. Rivermouth's farmers, the last ones downstream, grow the food that feeds the whole region — and they receive whatever water is left.

This year the rains did not come. It is a dry year, and there is not enough river for everyone's plans. Ministers from all three countries are traveling to meet at a regional cooperation council. Each will speak for their people. Each believes their need comes first.

The river cannot be made bigger. The only thing left to decide is how to share it.

First reaction (not answers yet): what did you notice? What do you wonder? Keep it open — the point is to pull students into the problem.

📚 Sources: National Geographic · Nile River (a real shared-river region) ↗ · United Nations · Water ↗

Multiple perspectives · d 0.75§113.18(c)(11), (c)(12), (c)(15)

Step 2 · Take a stakeholder role

Assign or let students choose a stakeholder. Each will reason from that group's point of view. Every role has something real at stake.

🏔️ Highland — the upstream nation

You are building a dam that will finally bring electricity to your people. To fill it you must hold back water. How much can you take, and what will you offer downstream in return?

🌾 Rivermouth — the downstream farming nation

Your farms feed the whole region, and you get the water last. In a dry year you could lose the harvest. What do you need guaranteed — and what can you live with?

🏙️ Midland's growing city

Millions of your people need safe drinking water first, before anything else. How do you make sure a city's basic needs are met without starving the farms?

🚜 Farmers & families

You work the land and depend on a steady flow. What is fair for the ordinary people who feed and are fed by the river?

🐟 Environmental & fisheries group

You speak for the fish, wetlands, and future. If the flow drops too low, the river's health — and the food it provides — collapses. What minimum flow must be protected?

🤝 Regional cooperation council

You represent no single country — your job is to help the three reach an agreement they will all keep. How do you build trust between neighbors who don't fully agree?

📚 Sources: CIA World Factbook · upstream country profile ↗ · CIA World Factbook · downstream country profile ↗

Problem-based learning · d 0.53§113.18(c)(22)(B), (c)(19)

Step 3 · Hunches → Know → Need-to-Know

Build three shared columns on chart paper. This defines the problem and plans the inquiry — the first moves of §113.18(c)(22)(B).

💭 Hunches	✅ Know (from the text)	❓ Need to know
Our guesses about what is happening and what might help.	Facts we can point to in the story (three countries; upstream/downstream; more people now; a new dam; a dry year; the river can't grow).	Questions we must answer to help — How much water does each country really need? How much does a dam hold back? What have real countries done to share a river? What happens to the fish if the flow drops?

Turn “Need to know” into the H of KWHL: How will we find out? (which sources, whom to ask). Record it — this is the class's research plan.

📚 Sources: Our World in Data · Water use & stress ↗ · World Bank · Water ↗

Transfer strategies · d 0.75§113.18(c)(8), (c)(19), (c)(20)

Step 4 · Inquiry & investigation

Groups pursue their “Need to know” questions using vetted sources (see the facilitator guide for suggested public sources). Students gather and use valid information, applying the source routine they practiced in Phase 2. Keep filling the Learned column of KWHL as answers come in.

Teacher-as-guide moves: answer a question with a question; point to a source, not the answer; ask “How do you know?” and “Whose point of view is missing?”

📚 Sources: World Bank · Water ↗ · Our World in Data · Water use & stress ↗ · CIA World Factbook ↗ · EIA · How hydropower works ↗. Full list + how-to in the facilitator guide.

Weigh & choose · d 0.75§113.18(c)(22)(B), (c)(19)

Step 5 · Propose & defend a sharing agreement

From their stakeholder's point of view, each group develops a recommendation for how the three countries should share the river — and defends it with evidence and trade-offs. Assessment happens throughout the process, not only here (the reasoning is the point).

Groups present an 8-part problem/solution brief (poster, slides, or spoken):

Title & group members (and your stakeholder role)
What is the problem?
Why is it a problem — and for whom?
Who are the stakeholders?
Options we considered (advantages & disadvantages of each)
Our recommended sharing agreement — including the trade-offs it asks each country to accept
The evidence and sources behind it
How we'd know if it worked (and what happens in the next dry year)

📚 Sources: U.S. EIA · Hydropower explained ↗ · United Nations · Water ↗

Evaluation & reflection · d 0.75§113.18(c)(22)(B), (c)(15)

Step 6 · Debrief & metacognition

Close the loop — the evaluate step of the problem-solving process. Discuss across roles so students hear how the same river looked from every side.

Did our agreement address the real problem — the dry year and the growing needs — or just one country's wish?
Did we use evidence from more than one source? Whose point of view did we still miss?
How did the river look different from an upstream chair than a downstream one? What did interdependence mean here?
Transfer: where else does this problem-solving process fit — a shared resource in our school, town, or region today?

Connect to today & to the standards: real neighboring countries share rivers like the Nile, the Mekong, and the Colorado, and they weigh these same trade-offs. Name the six steps students just used — that is §113.18(c)(22)(B).

📚 Sources: National Geographic · Nile River ↗ · Our World in Data · Access to water ↗

🧑‍🏫 Facilitator guide & sources ✅ Assessment pack

‹ Phase 2 — Deep Unit home

Aligned to (not reproduced from) 19 TAC Ch.113 §113.18; effect sizes from Visible Learning MetaX. This region and scenario are a teaching fiction based on real transboundary-river dynamics.