Each year Bishop Dunn Memorial School hosts a science fair for their students grades 5-8 and this semester I was able to be a part of it! Dr. Smirnova told us she and Doc Love, the science teacher at BDMS, wanted our class to take part in the science fair this semester to show the students examples of really good experiments. I was excited to start brain storming my ideas of what I wanted to do for a project. I decided I wanted to correlate my science fair project with the topic I taught the students in the after school program: Energy. After exploring the internet for different "energy" related science fair projects I finally came up with one. My question was "Can the color of your house reduce your energy footprint?" In other words can the color of your house save you money? Once you have a question the next step in the scientific method is to research your question. After researching different sites and articles it was time to make a hypothesis. A hypothesis is an educated guess. Our students are familiar with making hypotheses because of their practice within our inquiry lessons this semester. My hypothesis was "If your house is painted a dark color, then the inside of your house will be warmer and reduce your energy footprint." I continued on with the scientific method by conducting an experiment. To test my hypothesis I used four shoe boxes all the same size and painted each one a different color (black, grey and white). Inside each box I placed a thermometer and outside the boxes was a heat lamp. The heat lamp represented the sun and the boxes represented the houses. After recording my data I was able to draw the conclusion that proved my hypothesis to be true. This project was interesting because I haven't done anything like it in which I had to follow the scientific method step-by-step. I always wanted to participate in a science fair and now I had the chance!
Our students from the after school program loved seeing our projects on display and were eager to show us theirs. One project that stood out from the rest was done by a 4th grade student Daniel. I met Daniel this semester in the after school program and I could instantly tell he had a love for science. Although Daniel was not required to enter the science fair because he's only in 4th grade, he chose to because he wanted to express his findings. Daniel's project was all about dark matter. Before talking with Daniel about his project I had no clue what dark matter was, but he quickly informed me. Speaking with Daniel I could tell he was very passionate about his project and findings from various research he has done. He had three different models to represent dark matter each one explaining it in a different way to help his audience understand. I was truly inspired by Daniel's hard work and efforts with his project and I hope that I can help make my students have the same love Daniel has for science.
Each year Bishop Dunn Memorial School hosts a science fair for their students grades 5-8 and this semester I was able to be a part of it! Dr. Smirnova told us she and Doc Love, the science teacher at BDMS, wanted our class to take part in the science fair this semester to show the students examples of really good experiments. I was excited to start brain storming my ideas of what I wanted to do for a project. I decided I wanted to correlate my science fair project with the topic I taught the students in the after school program: Energy. After exploring the internet for different "energy" related science fair projects I finally came up with one. My question was "Can the color of your house reduce your energy footprint?" In other words can the color of your house save you money? Once you have a question the next step in the scientific method is to research your question. After researching different sites and articles it was time to make a hypothesis. A hypothesis is an educated guess. Our students are familiar with making hypotheses because of their practice within our inquiry lessons this semester. My hypothesis was "If your house is painted a dark color, then the inside of your house will be warmer and reduce your energy footprint." I continued on with the scientific method by conducting an experiment. To test my hypothesis I used four shoe boxes all the same size and painted each one a different color (black, grey and white). Inside each box I placed a thermometer and outside the boxes was a heat lamp. The heat lamp represented the sun and the boxes represented the houses. After recording my data I was able to draw the conclusion that proved my hypothesis to be true. This project was interesting because I haven't done anything like it in which I had to follow the scientific method step-by-step. I always wanted to participate in a science fair and now I had the chance! 
Our students from the after school program loved seeing our projects on display and were eager to show us theirs. One project that stood out from the rest was done by a 4th grade student Daniel. I met Daniel this semester in the after school program and I could instantly tell he had a love for science. Although Daniel was not required to enter the science fair because he's only in 4th grade, he chose to because he wanted to express his findings. Daniel's project was all about dark matter. Before talking with Daniel about his project I had no clue what dark matter was, but he quickly informed me. Speaking with Daniel I could tell he was very passionate about his project and findings from various research he has done. He had three different models to represent dark matter each one explaining it in a different way to help his audience understand. I was truly inspired by Daniel's hard work and efforts with his project and I hope that I can help make my students have the same love Daniel has for science.
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