How much turmoil does the science project cause familes?

[Playinghardball]

Are kids today REQUIRED to enter science fairs?

[OKNancy]

1. I can relate

I don't know how many products were tested, or beans planted, or two-way toothbrushes invented... but I do remember the struggle.
As a parent I hated the required science fair.

[winter is coming]

2. In some schools, yes.

When my kid was in elementary school, you had to do either science fair or history fair every year, and there were years when "history fair" wasn't an option. If you were in 3rd-5th grade that meant an individual or small group projects; kids in K-2 did class-sized projects with a teacher's guidance.

In middle school, kidlet now has history fair every year but no science fair.

[notadmblnd]

3. My son and I had a blast doing one of his science projects.

It wasn't for a science fair, it was assigned in class. But we made a double helix with marshmallows and licorice. He looked forward to sharing it with his friends after he was graded for it.

[FSogol]

4. Love it. Next time follow Strongbad's advice and do "The Affects of Gasoline on Fire."

[tridim]

5. I loved the science fair, and I loved working with my Dad on the project.

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. I dunno, but it was that pesky science project (mine was on the Voyager mission)

that led to my life long fascination with astronomy.

[frazzled]

7. I give that project an A

I hated these projects as well, and tried to stay out of them as much as possible ... because I thought it was totally unfair that the parent who was an architect would always build some fabulous display thing for their kid's (otherwise, just as goofy as everyone else's) project, and would win. Or then there were the families that spent a lot of money on supplies, or the kid whose dad was a nuclear physicist. Some other kid's single mom was a drug addict and couldn't help.

My kids went to inner city public schools that at the time incorporated everything from upper-middle class families to recent immigrants. (How were the Hmong parents, whose culture doesn't even have a written language and who never attended a school supposed to compete with the highly educated families)?

How about just creating science projects at school?

[LibertyLover]

8. My daughter was this year

In grade school participation was voluntary, but in her middle school every child in all three grades had to participate. In fact, it was part of their science grade for the first marking period. I am so not looking forward to the next two years.

[Control-Z]

10. I loved doing projects

with my kids. Though, the required projects were never that involved. In the lower grades they had to do things like make a family tree, build a leprechaun trap, construct a protective egg container to drop from the roof. Things along those lines.

Upper grades, 4 - 6, had school projects/field trips workout parents. Flying to Sacramento. Spending a weekend on a Pilgrim ship - wearing period clothing and working the ship. They swabbed decks, cooked meals, kept watch through the nights. In 6th grade they went up to the mountains for a week of science camp. It snowed the year my youngest went. She had a blast!!

I felt my kids had a rich learning experience during their elementary school years. Things changed once they went on to middle school. I still helped with a few projects but was so proud when they no longer needed me and were able to pull off great projects on their own.