OLDS — The world of science was front and centre at École Olds Elementary School (ÉOES) and Holy Trinity Catholic School over the past couple of weeks as students displayed their science projects.
ÉOES held theirs on Feb. 4. Holy Trinity held theirs on Feb. 10.
ÉOES fair
Lisa Hallett, who provides administrative support and student information services at ÉOES, says their fair this year was a pretty big deal because it was the first one held there since 2020.
“We had an amazing 47 entries. That included 61 students from Kindergarten to Grade 4,” Hallett wrote in an email. “We were so impressed with everyone's creativity and hard work.”
Several projects displayed during the ÉOES Fair and the Holy Trinity one will be displayed during the Mountain View Science Fair, which will be held March 1 at École Olds High School.
Rayden Rodych is one of the ÉOES who will be moving on to that regional fair.
Her project is about lung capacity.
“She began with a desire to explain lung function,” Hallett’s email said, adding that Rodych found a video about how to measure lung capacity.
“Her hypothesis was to determine if lung capacity increased with height,” the Hallett’s email said.
“She’s busy expanding on her results before the next science fair, but it looks like her hypothesis is generally accurate.”
Hallett said the device was “pretty easy to put together. The longest part is filling the water tub.”
For about an hour, Rodych’s classmates were measured.
It’s expected that she’ll now spend a couple hours expanding her research to include more adults.
Grade 1 ÉOES student Oliver Packer’s project was The Power of Magnets - The Ability to Attract and Repel.
He too qualified for the regional science fair.
“We were able to demonstrate how magnets are able to create momentum, levitation and anti-gravity,” Hallett wrote.
It took Packer about three weeks to research, build, test and create his project.
Grade 1 student ÉOES Simon Windsor did his science project on speeding cars.
“Simon wanted to find out which of his toy cars could go the fastest,” ÉOES Grade 4 teacher Reanna Windsor wrote.
“He built a ramp with his dad to use gravity to get the cars going fast,” she added.
“He measured how far they went and realized that distance was related to speed. He concluded that light cars with small, smooth wheels go the fastest.”
Simon worked on his project during three weekends.
“He enjoyed sharing his findings with his friends at the fair,” Reanna wrote.
Holy Trinity Catholic School science fair
There were some pretty interesting science fair projects in the Holy Trinity Catholic School gym on Feb. 10 as well.
Grade 3 student Elliot Ellis of Olds chose to do his on the famous five second rule; the idea that if you drop food on the floor, it’s still safe to eat if you pick it up within five seconds.
Ellis experimented with different times: two, five and 10 seconds.
The various options were set out in petri-type containers.
Ellis shone a light on those containers to look for bacteria.
“Anything two seconds is safe. Five seconds is not safe,” was the conclusion. “Five seconds and beyond.”
Ellis was asked what he wants to be when he grows up.
“An architect,” he said.
“Nothing like this, no studying of science or anything,” he was asked.
“Unhunh,” he replied.
Grade 5 Holy Trinity student Jessica Gardner did her project on electromagnetism.
“I started wanting to find out what electromagnetism is. I knew very little of it,” Gardner said.
“I thought that nobody else would want to do it because it might seem a bit hard. And I also wanted to learn new things, like I did with density last year.
“In the analysis, we figured out that if you reduce the voltage and turns for the miniature motors, it will spin faster and it will definitely go hotter. You do not want to try this one.”
Gardner also figured out that if the voltage is increased, heavier objects can be picked up.
Gardner said it took about four days to do her project from start to finish.
“My mom took all the pictures, my dad helped with the experiments,” she said, adding that her dad ordered a piece of equipment for the project from Amazon.
Deputy mayor Darren Wilson, one of the judges, was impressed.
“This is quite an extravagant experiment,” he said.
He asked about the research Gardner did for it.
She admitted that that research included Wikipedia.
“No AI (artificial intelligence)? You didn’t use AI or anything,” Wilson asked.
She shook her head.
Gardner said when she grows up “I either want to be an engineer, based on this, or a veterinarian. I’m in love with cats and dogs.”
Holy Trinity student Aidric Dulmage of Didsbury did his project on starch water. He titled it StarCH Wars. It featured depictions of flying craft from the Star Wars films.
Starch water is created by boiling vegetables or pasta. It can act as a fertilizer for plants and helps spur the growth of good bacteria.
“I was testing different types of water and seeing which was best. And one that was best that I found was starch water,” Dulmage said.
“I wanted to see what type of search water works best out of out of these three: vegetable water, rice water and pasta water, and I had tap water as a control.”
“Pasta water can produce taller plants. Rice water produces higher flower yield. It also produces the most tomatoes in number and yield,” his conclusion said.
Dulmage said he decided to call his entry StarCH Wars because “it’s a war of what to test.”
Dulmage said when he grows up he wants to be a herpetologist, a person who studies amphibians and reptiles.
Ellis, Dulmage and Gardner were among the Holy Trinity students whose projects advanced to the regional science fair.
Others were created by Anne and Elize Maitim, Barrett Dulmage, Levi Andrusiak and Corbin Adie as well as Ben Scarcella.
