Science Fair for All Students

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One day in January we got into a family discussion about how raisins come to be. My kindergartener was distracted by this phenomenon, not fully understanding how a big, round, juicy grape can shrivel up into a dry raisin.

Thinking ahead to the science fair that was coming up in March, I casually suggested that this would be a good science fair project and she was gung ho. Of course, my 5th grader didn’t want anything to do with the science fair; God forbid she do any kind of “extra” schoolwork. But that sure didn’t stop her sister!

For 30 days she took careful notes and pictures and studied these four raisins that we placed on the window sill. It didn’t take long - maybe 4 days - to notice they were starting to wrinkle up. By Day 15 I kept having to remind her to check the grapes since the novelty of it wore off, but her little brain really understood what she was witnessing.

The day of the science fair we put her pictures on her posterboard and she told me what to write as captions. Since all the students have to explain their projects to “listeners,” we practiced together and she carefully explained all the steps.

I believe there were only two kindergarteners who participated and my daughter was certainly in her element, explaining her project to all who would listen. That’s partly due to her personality and but also in part because she was truly interested in this question and it was uncomplicated.

Hopefully next year she will show the same kind of enthusiasm for the science fair.

By the way, it took 30 days for our grapes to turn into raisins. Had there been more sun, it would have taken fewer days!