Education for sustainable development (ESD) aims at enabling people to contribute to sustainable development. The central educa-tional objective is to develop “Gestaltungskompetenz” (shaping competency). Water is one of the major bases for human life, and thus an important issue for education for sustainable development. This article aims at demonstrating the relevance of the topic of “water” and at indicating which approaches and methods can be used with this theme in ESD to raise awareness of the importance of natural resources and to develop competencies for the sustainable development of our (global) societ