Homeschool Science Fair (without the fair)

Adele is doing a science fair project without the fair, since we are no longer a part of a homeschool co-op that does a science fair. 

We still aren't sure what Adele's specific science fair question will be or what her experiment will look like. 

That will come later. 

For now, Adele is interested in preserving cut flowers, so that's the topic we are researching everyday more and more in depth. 

As we sit together and search for sources and read through information, we naturally ask more and more questions about the specifics involved with the topic, and we write those questions down, too. 

So, after only a few days of research, we already have several questions to answer. 

So at this point, we aren't afraid we won't know what to do next; We have enough questions already to keep us busy for days, and I'm sure more questions will arise.

This research portion of the project may take weeks. 

Adele has started keeping handwritten research notes (and she also records all the new research questions that come up) in a composition book. 

After a Google search using a few key words or phrases about the topic or questions, we click on articles or sites that seem promising and legitimate. 

After a brief scan of the website or article, I can usually tell if a source has valuable information that answers all or even part of one or more of our questions about her topic. 

At that point, we read the content together and we discuss it and I explain complicated things (if I can.) 

Note: If I can't explain difficult content, I just tell her I can't explain it or I don't understand it (yet), and then I have the opportunity to model to her how to keep going in the face of uncertainty. 

Once we have read a source and we know what content applies to her research topic directly, I will either print the article and highlight the content that needs to go into her notebook, or I will copy and paste words and phrases from an article or website into a word.doc that I print for her. 

Then she hand copies all the important notes and info into her notebook. 

She's also keeping track of the specific sources and the relevant website addresses, so she can make a bibliography. 

It's a very time consuming process! 

And, as you can see, I help her a lot. 

Part of what I am doing is showing her how to research, and that is something that needs to be modeled elbow to elbow. 

After the first day of research, after more than an hour of taking notes by hand, Adele still said, "This is fun!" 

I agreed with her that it is fun, indeed!

It's fun to learn about the specific content she wants to research- flower preservation. 

But it's also fun to learn that you can learn about anything that you are curious about by simply being willing to ask and answer questions about the topic. 

One of the main things I want her to take away from this project is the knowledge that she can learn anything if she's willing to do the work.