Recently, both Charles & James participated in the local Science Fair; James as a member of the public school system and Charles as a homeschooler. They had a ton of fun working on this stuff and both learned so much. There are tons of great science books out there to help give you ideas for inventive projects and I've got some of them. Were their final projects that iventive? LOL, unfortunately, due to various reasons, no.
James was rather outside the box originally. He had looked through one of our books and came upon a green house experiement where you grow some quick sprouts, put a plastic glass over some of them and see how they then compare. He took it a bit furthter and added a paper cup as well. His hypothesis was that the paper cup would work better growing the plants than the plastic or none at all. LOL He had a lot to learn about how plants and light interact. However, less than a week before the fair (after working on this for almost two months) Kitty knocked it all over and was dancing on it when I discovered her. Two year old toddlers move too quickly! But we had no time to fix it, we hadn't taken much pictures yet, and there wasn't anything for display anymore so as a quick rememdy James got to pick up a little potato clock kit. He had a blast with that and loved messing around with it all. He ttried so many different food substances it wasn't funny. And surprisingly (this is coming from one who reallyt doesn't understand much about electric currents etc.) a lot of stuff worked much better than I had anticipated. His new hypothesis was that tomatoes would work the best. They worked well, but not the best. The best was actually plain old soda!
Charles made crystals! He had a lot of fun if also a lot of frustration with this. He loves doing this kind of stuff and we let him choose a project we thought would provide ample opportunity for satisifaction of a job well done and quick results since it's so easy. Or, at least, it's supposed to be! We wound up making several different solutions. The first one was with ammonia & liquid blueing and it was supposed to work really fast. It didn't. We following the directions but it just would't do anyting. We even did it again just in case we messed it up the first time. We have come to the conclusion that it just wasn't warm enough here for the proper evaporation to happen. It took over a month for those crystals fo finally appear (after the fair was over of course). The second solution we made was epsom salts and it was touted to work even faster than the one with ammonia and blueing. It didn't do anything either! So by this time Charles is getting really upset. He wants crystals! So we go digging some more and I found out about crystals grown with washing soda and borax. So we made solutions with those and by golly it finally worked! And fast too. Charles would check them every 30 minutes or so and itw as obvious that they had grown. He got so excited over that.
http://www.terimore.com/ This one has over 300 projects to choose from. These cost money, $6.95 apiece (or cheaper if you buy in bulk) but the blueprints are supposed to have
Details about the scientific method
List of needed materials
Vital information on how to make your presentation
Details about "What the judges are looking for"
+ 16 free original science games
This one was a little confusing because it wasn't set up by age, although if you looked at
project idea, it would say who it was appropriate for. It did at least group it into K-7 and
8-12
I have a ton more sites that are just too numerous to list here. If you're looking for something specific,
such as where I found some of the graphics used on their boards, just let me know!
The musings of my childrens journey in the wonders of love, life, and spirituality. Love, Live, Laugh, and Learn. That's what it's all about. Welcome and blessed be.
* Carey ~ Beloved husband that puts up with everything.
He's majoring in history, loves to read, play D&D and Mech Warriors.
* Ami ~ Me. Busy teacher and housewife. I love to spend
time with the kids, read, garden, cook, knit, sew, make my own soaps
and salves.
* James ~ Our oldest at five. He loves to build with blocks, enjoys the guitar, adores robots and believes he
can't live without his trucks (and skateboard).
* Charles ~ My little monkey! Our youngest son at four, he
is the most precious gift ever recieved on a birthday.
He's a wonderful, sunny little guy that's very inquisitive and artistic.
* Meradydd ~ Our oldest daughter at three.
An opinionated and exceedingly bossy little girl with a temper to match her copper hair.
My little fashion diva that loves shoes, furlies, & hair pretties.
* Kathrynn ~ Kitty is my 1 year old little angel. She's a beautiful, mellow little girl that's extremely patient but is also starting to show her claws.
Abraham Lincoln ~ You have a Bible and a library card what more could you possibly need? You prefer the Charlotte Mason Method of reading living books for everything: historical fiction, biographies, real histories, nature guides, etc. No soon-to-be-outdated textbooks for you. Visit my blog: Guilt Free Homeschooling Take this quiz!
