I was having a good chuckle over these bad science fair experiments – some of those HAVE to be Photoshopped, right? – when I stopped short at the last one, “Plants and Pop.” Ohhh, man. My best friend Annie Fleck and I did a joint science fair experiment together in, like, fifth grade that was all about WORMS and POP. No joke. We kept various styrofoam cups full of dirt and earthworms in Annie’s basement, and every few days we’d add drops from various cans of soft drinks and observe the worms’ health. Based on how lethargic/dead they were, we somehow extrapolated which drinks had the most caffeine. It was Bad Science combined with Cruelty to Animals for the Double-Plus Win! We actually got to go to Regionals with it, which was all we really wanted (because it was held at a local college and we got to swim in their big pool for part of the day).
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I once judged a middle school science fair in Mishawaka. Funniest project? “Short Man, Tall Man: Who Runs Faster?”
The kid set up a race course in his yard, timed people running through it, then measured their heights. The best part was that he took polaroids of the participants, and they were all obviously family members- mom, little brother, grandmother. He also didn’t control for age or sex (80 year old grandma and 11 year brother were the same height, but had very different times).
That made me laugh and laugh. What a great idea for a project! I hope you gave him at least some points for creativity. As Rodd just said when I showed it to him, “This is how we learn about the Scientific Method.” 🙂
Just wanted to set the record straight. It was 6th grade my darling, not fifth. No matter, we had a blast jumping off of the 3-meter diving board at regionals, didn’t we? I still remember Madonna’s “Like a Prayer” playing on Mom’s car radio as she drove us up there for that science fair. One of the best times I have ever had!