At an elementary school science fair, how many projects do you think you'll see using the ol' egg and vinegar trick? How about 20? Eww. That was by far the most popular this year. And only because the paperwork that went home specifically stated that no one was to do a volcano. There was one volcano.
Yes, tonight we all tromped over to the school to look at all of the science fair projects for this year. All of the 3 - 5 grade students are required to do a project. Along side the eggy vinegar "experiments" were the carnations with food coloring, electromagnetism mechanisms (say that 3 times fast), and the ever present "Which (insert product here) is the best one?"
Kudos to the boy that built a lego robot to race his pet rat. And the girl who built mini greenhouses out of different color plastic (redhouses and bluehouses I guess) to grow plants inside. My son tested the reaction rate of a reactant with different surface area (i.e. Alka Selzer in whole tablets, half, quarters, and powder). It was pretty cool... no bias here.
I must make one recommendation for all future projects. No one should be allowed to take pictures of their moldy, furry, black, or slimy "experiments". Some things just shouldn't be looked at in the school cafeteria. Especially not after dinner. And heaven forbid they should actually bring the thing in a zippie bag and hang it on the board. Skip that table!
I do (however much I mock) think it's a great program. Students need to use their brains, their hands, their kitchen (mossy things excluded). My son has already announced that the idea of being a chemical engineer appeals to him. I think he plans to blow things up on purpose and get paid for it - without injury of course. More power to him. When we ask "why?" it's surprising what we come up with.
2 comments:
YAY for science! It is funny that you wrote about the science fair because I had my kids at school disect...wait for it...lima beans! They seemed to think that it was really cool that they could see the little start of a plant. I also like to think of my amazing plant project in fifth grade. I was so excited when I won first prize. I do have to say that Mom did an awful lot to help me on that one. Oh sure, I had to work har but it would never have been that good if it wern't for mom! YAY for Moms!
Hey... Mom did a plant project with me too... and I won first place. Hmmm we don't have a scientific mom or anything do we?
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