<p>K- my D and her team have been working on their stirling engines…and it ain’t werkin too good…argghhh</p>
<p>the exactness of everything is hard to obtain with tin cans, car goop, and nails…</p>
<p>i just wish that if you really tried, and built it twice and it STILL doesn’t work, that if you write a paper explainging what you did and why you think it failed that it should count for something…after all, isn’t that part of science…</p>
<p>citygirlsmom, science is all about things that do not work. Just look at any ACS journal - “yeah, computer modeling predicted that XYZ compund would be the best inhibitor of the ABC enzyme that plays the pivotal role in breast cancer, however, when we finally synthesized the compound, it did not inhibit the damned thing” Blah, blah, blah…</p>
<p>If all science projects worked as predicted, we would not have to deal with cancer and AIDS anymore.</p>
<p>see, that is my point!!! just wish some science teachers who grade these building projects got that…that just because your project didn’t work, doesn’t mean you didn’t learn…</p>
<p>I want to run this engine thingy over…</p>
<p>totally- science is trying what does and doesn’t work!
if you are afraid to fail- you will never find out anything new.
besides- aren’t you glad you aren’t the one in high school?
;)</p>
<p>Why is it so frustrating for you? I don’t know what a stirling engine. Is this a really noisy messy project destroying your kitchen?</p>
<p>My son’s best friend won first place in a science fair for explaining that his experiment didn’t actually prove his hypothesis because he’d neglected to do the right controls. (Admittedly elementary school.)</p>
<p>My kids (and the family) learned something new from every project they did. I was sorry when they stopped having to do them - though my youngest gravitates towards all the building projects at Science Olympiad. So we know all about boomilevers that don’t hold 30 kilos and violins made out of plywood that unexpectedly break the night before the contest. (He called it a triolin and played on three strings.)</p>
<p>its is frustrating for ME, because, yes, the stuff D is working with is messy and smelling, and someone has to go to the store to get more supplies and D is frustrated because she has built it 3 times, and a minute hole can cause the whole thing to fail…and i want my dining room table back…and I am frustrated because I dont think she has “failed” because it doesn’t work</p>
<p>and I am frustrated that you need a drill, metal cutters, goop from three different kinds of stores, you need more supplies than are listed on the instructions, that the teacher only has working models on you tube, </p>
<p>I am mostly frustrated that the process doesn’t seem to be as important as the result…and process is what science is all about</p>
<p>Science is messy. What have you taught your daughter? Give up after 3 tries?</p>
<p>No not give up after three tries of cutting up several metal cans, going to get more goop, creating three versions of the mechanics of the device, testing it to see if its leaking and not finding a leak, and doing this for a month., so no, not giving up after three tries, but sometimes, something just ain’t gonna work, so sometimes, a lesson can ALSO be taken from not 'succeeding" don’t you think?</p>
<p>What lesson does this project teach, those who have all the perfect tools, which many families do not have, can maybe succeed, while thise who don’t have special saws, and electric drills, and an endless chance to get more goop, well, it doesn’t teach about why this thing works, it doesn’t teach why it doesn’t work, it teaches that you must make it work no matter what, and learning why yours didn’t succeed isn’t even part of the equation.</p>
<p>And yes, science is messy, but what is the point of doing this kind of project that requires toxic chemicals, googles, fire, etc at home? I think about the single mom in my Ds class who has the basic hammer and plyers in her home and couldn’t afford to by metal cutters and a drill in order to to do this project so had to go hunting to borrow these things in her off time</p>
<p>yes, science is messy, but should families have to disrupt their lives for this kind of project…i think not</p>
<p>I do think for projects like this high schools should have shop available for those who don’t have tools at home.</p>
<p>This is a funny high school science story:
When my son was in 9th grade, he was in the Science Olympiad. One of the events he signed up for was the “Egg Drop” which involved devising something onto which raw eggs can be dropped from a great height without breaking. (I think the event may since have been revised to an event where the eggs are wrapped and dropped, but this one involved dropping naked raw eggs.) We have a rather new home with a formal two-story foyer with a hardwood floor, so he had the perfect spot for perfecting his egg drop :eek: Even though we insisted that dropcloths be placed in the foyer, there was still quite a mess of broken egg splattering! I am all for education and science learning, but letting my kid to drop eggs from high above onto the floor of my foyer was above and beyond the call of duty! </p>
<p>Finally, he devised something which should have been a sure winner - instead of a padded box to cushion the eggs like most people were making, he used a “net” of extremely sticky heavy duty duct tape stretched loosely over a box. When the egg landed, it stuck to the tape and did not fly out of the box and break. However, there was an unforeseen factor which caused him to be eliminated on his first try at the actual competition. He did not know that the egg drop was in an unheated outdoor stairwell and the weather that day was extremely cold and windy. The tape he used was VERY sticky at room temperature, but the adhesive hardened and had no stick at all in the cold. It was very disappointing but an important lesson was learned - to consider all of the factors (such as temperature) when devising a solution to a problem.</p>
<p>We told our kids when they did Science Olympiad again to please sign up for events other than the Egg Drop !!!</p>
<p>Some teachers do understand.</p>
<p>For my school, every ninth grader has to build a working power generator (it’s very small and doesn’t have to generate much energy, just enough to light a very small bulb).</p>
<p>I worked hard on mine and it didn’t work, and my teacher told me, “You did everything right; I don’t know why it didn’t work.” And gave me the points anyway, because she knew how hard I worked. :)</p>
<p>I totally understand, CGM…I know that project that I mentioned was VERY frustrating for both the kids and the parents, because the magnets we needed to generate the energy were only available at RadioShack and our whole DISTRICT did them at the same time, so we ended up having to drive an hour away just to get the effing magnets. I don’t even think they do the project anymore, but you’d think they could’ve called RadioShack and said “Hey, we’re doing a project, could you please order extra of blahblahblah?”</p>
<p>I think things like this depend on the teacher. You should talk to him/her and see what he/she says.</p>