Science Fair Resources

The primary objective of creating a science fair is to teach students some important scientific methods for solving science problems. The goal of a science project is not to win a prize or ribbon, but to strengthen thinking and planning skills, which will eventually help students gain a better understanding of science. The score of a science fair project is usually decided after the judges interview each student about his or her project. The results and the declaration of the winners are not judged according to the effort put in by the students, but they are based on the quality of their work and the level of scientific skills that are integrated in the project.

To make a science project a quality project, it is necessary that the student has great interest in science. There are limitless possibilities for young scientists. The first thing that a student needs to do is choose a topic that he or she is interested in. There are several branches of science as well as a number of sub-divisions in each branch. Certain fields in science, such as geophysics and biochemistry, overlap, and some others, such as physics and astronomy, are closely interlinked. Therefore, certain topics may cover two or more branches of science, and these are quite common in science fairs. Few of the subjects that students always find interesting include meteorology, acoustics, geography, vulcanology, geology, oceanography, zoology, Egyptology, botany, chemistry, astronomy, and genetics.

Ideally, the project should contain a title that is catchy. Besides being catchy, the title should also be able to provide a brief description of the project. After the title is decided, the student should write a good background or state the purpose of the science project. In the background section, a reason for choosing a particular topic should be given. The student should also explain what he or she wants the readers to know about the project. Discoveries that are made during the course of the project should also be written down. If the project entails setting up tests or requires participants to fill a survey sheet, the student should complete those jobs first. Another important feature is the presentation of the science project. Try to make the project as neat and attractive as possible, without diverting the reader’s concentration away from the topic.

For most science fair projects, a display board is required for communicating messages to readers. Ideally, the student should use a three-panel display board that is 48 inches wide and 36 inches tall. The information that has been gathered should be organized on the display board in a similar way as a newspaper. The thread of the science project will be read from top to bottom. The display should include an abstract of the project, variables, questions, background research, hypothesis, and so on, but make sure it is well-formatted and structured. In order to make the display board neat and attractive, the student should use a minimum of a 16-point font size for the text, a title that is readable from a distance, as well as pictures and diagrams to make the science project look even better.

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Science Fair Resource for Students and Teachers

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