Science Fair Experimentation

One of the biggest misconceptions kids have about their projects is that unless everything goes perfectly, it has failed.  This morning, some of the kids started to collect data for their experiments.  L. and D. had the idea to build batteries, a fine exoeriement for middle school aged students.  They had an experiment from Apologia's Middle School Chemistry and Physics textbook. L. had also performed several electrical experiments in stations last summer at Science Camp, including Squishy Circuits.  L. and D. spent several hours mixing the playdough, sanding pennies, and building circuits with LED bulbs.  They used lemon juice, coffee, potatoes, battery packs, etc.  After an entire morning experimenting, they cheerfully abandoned the project and changed direction altogether because they could not get the experiment to perform according to their expectations, after doing some great science!

Students have trouble seeing that the trial and error, redesign, and frustrations are at the heart of the scientific method. In fact, it makes for good discussion during the child's presentation. I am partially to blame; I select experiments which deliver good results to avoid some of this frustration and angst associated when an experiment does not work well.

L. and D. switched to testing the pH of saliva.  They spent the rest of the morning saturating pieces of water color paper in universal indicator, and drying the paper with a hair dryer.  The two calibrated the paper with lemon juice using the pH color scale in the Apologia textbook.  They will compare their strips with commercial strips.  The two left armed to collect data.  L. and D. Took five minutes, decided how long to leave the strip in a person's mouth, and which questions to ask their participants.

Another pair of students, P. and M. are using an inexpensive cell phone radiation meter to collect data.  They spent the morning doing preliminary testing: type of cell phone, with or without the case, upside down or face up, on or off, texting, playing music, sending or receiving a call, etc.  they were getting mixed data and retested using different sensitivities on the meter.  M. was a little frustrated because the project was open-ended.  The pair tested everyone's cell phones, the land line, the TV, and three old iPods.  I sent them home frustrated with instructions to research EMFs and cell phone radiation.  Do different devices emit varying amount of radiation?  Is the radiation dangerous?  If so, how is it dangerous?  Even if the data from the meter varies, they have a tremendous amount of information to consider as they conduct their project, continue to research the topic and collect more data.