Reflections and Science Fair

***I’m a little late with blogging about these things, but better late than never.

Nate and I were both kind of hoping to just skip the whole Reflections thing this time around.  After last year’s ended so nicely (with all three kids getting trophies), we figured we would just call it good and be done with Reflections projects.  The kids had other ideas.  Emily was the one most enthusiastic about it.  She did five different projects.  In the process, the other kids caught the bug and we ended up with all four of them participating. 

The sixth graders made paper mache masks for an art project.  Ben decided to do Chewbacca.  He was planning on cutting 7,000 pieces of brown yarn and gluing them onto his mask.  To save his time and my sanity, I introduced him to the concept of faux fur.  His project turned out super cool.  After turning it in for a grade, he decided to enter it in Reflections as 3D art.  The theme was “The Magic of a Moment”.  It was a stretch to make his Chewie mask fit that theme, but we worked it out and he ended up winning.

Emily entered projects in five catagories: 3D art, visual art, literature, photography, and dance.  Some of them were high effort; others were just last minute “insurance plans” to improve her odds of winning.  Ironically, the only trophy she won was for the dance (to Do You Believe in Magic) that she did the night before the projects were due.  Her other projects were a 3D scene out of model magic, a poem, an oil pastel on canvas (picture of a sunset), and a photo of a reflection on a pond (my personal favorite).

Elise did three projects.  She made a bunny popping out of a hat, choreographed a dance (to Under the Sea), and wrote a story about losing her tooth at Disneyland.  She ended up winning for both the dance and the story.  Her dance actually went on to win at the district level and got 2^nd place in the region, which leads me to believe that either the judges were going for creativity over actual skill, or there weren’t very many entries. J

Abby decided at the last minute that she wanted to a project too.  I gave her a piece of cardboard and some model magic.  She made a cute little 3D fish.  She started at the tail.  By the time she got to the head, she had run out of room to put bubbles coming out the fish’s mouth like she had planned.  Instead, she put them behind the fish.  The judges loved her little tooting fish and, much to my surprise, she won a trophy too.

I was very pleased that we lucked out again and all four kids won trophies.  I know that things won’t always be so equitable, but it is nice when they are.

We also had our first science fair experience this year.  Ben had to conduct an experiment for one of his homework assignments.  He tested different brands of batteries to see how cost effective each one was.  Entering his project into the science fair was optional, but since he had already done the bulk of the work, we encouraged him to make a display board and go to the fair.  He took 2^nd place in the school science fair in November which qualified him to go to the district science fair in February.  The district fair was at Weber State University.  Ben thought it was super cool to spend the day on a college campus.  He had lots of fun and ended up with a 2^nd place win in his category.  We didn’t get the best picture of Ben at the award ceremony, but I love that he has his arm around the superintendent. Every other kid stood with both hands in front of them holding their certificate.  Not Ben.  He walked up and put his arm around Superintendent Stephens like they were old friends.

We thought that was the end of the road, but Mrs. Barney called and said that if Ben wanted to go to the state science fair, the school would pay for his registration.  The fair was Monday at the Dee Events Center.  It was a long day for Ben and not as much fun as the district fair.  He came away with an honorable mention and a $1,000 scholarship (to Westminster College . . . along with everybody else who participated J).