One of the experiments explored the prospects of a “blubber glove” keeping a hand warm in ice water, while another experiment created “bath bomb” tablets to change the color of bath water while moisturizing the skin.
Both of the experiments, as well as a number of others, won first place in their categories during the district-wide science fair held at Floyd C. Fretz Middle School Friday.
The event, conducted by enrichment teachers Tammy Dittman and Wes Lohrman, involved some 300 students from all four schools in the Bradford Area School District. Ribbons and certificates were earned by participating students. Younger children also received small gifts.
Dittman, who serves as enrichment teacher for George G. Blaisdell (GGB) and School Street elementary schools, said children as young as pre-kindergarten age opted to participate in the event. Lohrman serves as enrichment teacher for Fretz and high school students.
“Of the GGB classroom teachers, we had 10 choose to participate with their classes this year,” Dittman said, noting classrooms worked together on projects.
She said the upper levels of children, in grades second through fifth, did individual work or worked with partners on projects created from their own ideas.
“They did a number of things, they did informational displays, experiments and inventions,” Dittman said. Examples of projects included displays on the life cycle of frogs, the solar system, tornados and magnets.
A student who won first place was fifth-grade student Ava Peterson, who created bath bombs with her partner, Grace Tyler.
In describing a bath bomb, Ava said one simply drops it in the bath water to change its color.
She said it is quite safe, and promised the water won’t change the color of the bather’s skin.
Ava then described how she and Grace created the new toiletry item.
“We put citric acid and baking soda together and added epsom salts to it,” she explained. “In a separate bowl, we put olive oil, water and food dye and mixed it all together. We then packed (all ingredients) together and froze them.”
The thawed out material was then broken into smaller pieces and given out as free samples to those who visited the science fair.
Ava’s mother, Precious, noted her daughter has also done innovative projects to help humanity, as she collected funds this past fall to send to victims of Hurricane Irma.
Another first-place project was the blubber glove experiment conducted by sixth-grade students Logan Sunafrank and Abby Coffman. The two determined that placing a hand in a plastic glove, coating it with shortening and then covering the coated glove with another larger plastic glove actually insulated the extremity against the extreme cold of ice water. They theorized that this accurately mimicked the insulation created by the blubber, or fat, found in a polar bear.
Neither of the students were available to comment, but Dittman said she thought the experiment was beneficial to the students.
“It’s those kinds of (experiments) that make science make sense,” Dittman said. “And they come up with these experiments by themselves.”
Parents at the event with their children included David Greene, whose third-grade daughter, Israel, took second place in her static electricity experiment. Greene said he believes events such as science fairs are very important for children.
“Not every kid is going to care about this, but if they’re in sports, you go to their games,” Greene remarked. “Some kids want to do this so you go to the science fair because we need scientists, too. I think we need more scientists than we need athletes.”
