ONTARIO – For the first time in over a decade, Ontario Middle School hosted a district Science Fair that encouraged students across three grades to explore the sciences.
At least 228 science fair exhibits were sprawled across the Ontario Middle School gymnasium on Wednesday evening, from the entire eighth grade class as well as the sixth and seventh grade honors classes.
Projects ranged from comparing the growth rates of standard plants versus genetically modified plants, researching whether styles of fingerprints can be inherited between relatives, and studying how things dissolve.
Ontario hasn’t held a district science fair since 2002. Bringing the fair back was the idea of eighth grade science teacher Charlie Ridenour, aiming to broaden his students’ interest in science.
“Not every student is interested in what we’re learning in the classroom,” Ridenour said. “This allows them to learn science from the standpoint of what they’re interested in, because they choose their topics and pick what’s interesting to them.
“It allows them to go through the scientific process without me trying to teach them something they’re not interested in.”
That certainly was the case with sixth grader Brandon Litteral, who chose to complete a project on wave velocity. By dropping a block of wood from the same height in varying depths of water, Litteral studied how fast the waves traveled.
“I’ve been very interested in weather and how patterns move, and this is related to tsunamis and very intense weather patterns,” Litteral said. “It interests me so much compared to like, how force is making a car move. I’ve never really been interested in that compared to this; this is one of my favorite things.”
Not surprisingly, Litteral said he dreamed of becoming a meteorologist one day. His favorite part of completing his project was “getting to know how nature works.”
“It’s cool how everything in this environment works,” he said.
Another exhibit from eighth grader Trina Lewis aimed to study how fears can change over time. Lewis said she narrowed down fear responses to three parts of the brain, then surveyed her classmates to discover what their fears were.
“My conclusions were that children were afraid of simple stuff like spiders and snakes, and then teens and young adults are afraid of life in general,” Lewis said. “The most common fear was death, between all of the age groups.”
Lewis said her own fearfulness motivated her to discover what the fears of others might be.
“My favorite part was discovering the different parts of the brain, because I find that really interesting and I want to be a doctor,” she said.
Ridenour said while the sixth and seventh grade honors classes began their projects in mid October, his eighth graders began their projects on the second day of school. Many of the projects involved a significant time investment, and a lot of independent research.
“They had to do the majority of this outside the classroom,” Ridenour said. “We would spend one day a week on this, everything else was completed outside of class.”
The projects were judged by 35 volunteer judges ranging from teachers hailing from Lexington, Crestview, Hillsdale and Ashland as well as professionals in the engineering and parks field. Ridenour said he invited judges from all areas of the county in order to give the students a different perspective.
“It’s one thing for me to talk to them on a daily basis, this prepares them for what they’re going to face in the future,” he said. “Interacting with people they don’t know and having simple presentation skills as well as being able to defend their work is important.”
One outside judge was Anne Petrie, an eighth grade science teacher in Lexington. Petrie and her fellow judges were required to judge student exhibits based on knowledge achieved, use of the scientific method, clarity of expression and originality and creativity.
Petrie is no stranger to science fairs, having both judged them and organized them in the past. Ontario’s, she said, was “tremendous.”
“I think it’s interesting they start them in sixth grade,” Petrie said. “I like that the eighth graders have been doing them since the start of the school year because it’s a long-term, really well thought-out project.”
One of Petrie’s favorite exhibits as of early Wednesday evening was a project aimed at determining whether dogs were right-pawed or left-pawed, similar to humans.
“I thought that was so creative,” she said. “The kids are really well-spoken, it seems like they’ve really done well.”
Of the 228 entries in Ontario’s science fair, those with a “superior” ranking will have the opportunity to move on to the district science fair at Ashland University in March. However, no matter the rankings at the end of the evening, Ridenour had one goal in mind for his students.
“Learning about the scientific method and how the scientific method can apply outside of just the classroom, and how science is involved in students’ daily lives,” he said.
