Big Brains

We had some exciting moments in our family this week. Joel's class had a science fair. They were told about this sometime before Christmas, and the kids had to have their project selected before the break. Then, they were supposed to be working on it over the past several weeks in preparation for the science fair. When Joel asked me what he should do for his project, my brain instantly went back to an episode of "Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide." If you have not seen that show on Nickelodeon, you--and your kids--are missing out big time. Each hilarious episode follows the adventures of Ned, Cookie and Moze as they teach you the basics of how to survive middle school. The episodes include such subjects as: The Bus, PE, Cell Phones, Wood Shop, Girls, Boys, The First Day of School, etc. But my favorite episode is about the science fair. All the kids (and their parents) have come up with crazy, complex projects. But one boy does a very simple experiment of "Which paper towel absorbs the most water." Everyone makes fun of his project, but in the end he wins first place because all of the other projects have self-destructed and basically destroyed the school and all the other projects. The lesson from the episode was that you don't have to do anything fancy--all that matters is that you follow the Scientific Method.

So I suggested to Joel that he do the paper towel experiment, and he thought that was fantastic. While the other kids in his class (actually the parents) were doing complicated things that really couldn't be quantified, Joel did nothing. The project was due Friday, and so Thursday when Joel got home from school we started his project. 4 brands of paper towels, cut into sheets of the same size; he weighed them dry; he dunked them in water; he weighed them wet; we made a table and a bar graph; we took some pictures; we made his display board. It was very simple, but very clearly followed the scientific method. He came away with 2nd place out of 60 kids! For the record, there is no way the boy who got 1st place actually did his project--the award was for his dad. Joel keeps telling me this, and he is very happy with his 2nd place medal. He wore it to church today, in fact.

Abram's high school participated in the Oregon Academic Decathlon this past weekend. I went along for fun--yes, I think things like that are fun. When he first told me about the event last year, I thought he was kidding, because I had only heard of an academic decathlon on High School Musical, and I thought it was a joke. But there truly is a USAD organization, and it is big time. It's just that Oregon is slow to catch on, apparently.

There is a school nearby us who has won this competition for many years straight. Abram's team wanted so bad to beat those scoundrels. Their field of study was the French Revolution, and the novel they studied was A Tale of Two Cities (one of my personal favorites). I made his team a little good luck charm before we headed to the competition--I knit a rectangle with the rival school's name knit into the pattern. If you haven't read Tale of Two Cities in a while, the evil Madame DeFarge knits the names of the hit-list and beheaded into the pattern of the things she knits. It's the secret code that this bloodthirsty, yet seemingly harmless woman, uses to keep this information. The team and their coach thought this was hilarious, and they carried it around as a good luck charm. The coach and I both thought there was no chance we would win.

When it came down to it, they announced 3rd place, and it wasn't us. Then they announced second place--and it was the rival school, and then first place was Abram's school.

We're going to Omaha for the national competition in April. I get to go along as a chaperone, which I am so excited about. I am also now the team's official language and literature tutor. I never thought I would actually go back to Omaha. Abram is very excited to go see his birthplace.