Dad of Divas' Reviews: Book Review - Science Fair Winners: Junkyard Science

Monday, September 27, 2010

Book Review - Science Fair Winners: Junkyard Science

About the Book
Pull on your gloves and experience the science of trashology! It's all about the stuff that’s thrown away: analyzing the waste produced by your school's cafeteria, understanding the decomposition rates of garbage bags, comparing the cost effectiveness of one-use batteries versus rechargeables. This book is peppered with enlightening extras and humorous asides, such as background stories from expert "trashologists." Plus, kids get tips on how to rock the science fair.

My Take on the Book
This book is a unique and wonderful science fair resource.Karen Romano Young has written a "cook book" of science fair projects for young readers. She presents projects in a "kid friendly " way. Karen helps the young reader through a journey of deeply satisfying projects. You will find so many ways to learn in this book. Be aware that these projects focus on junk, garbage, waste, recycling, and reusing.

So let's take a look at the contents of this book.
There are twenty sections so it will be easy for your child to locate a project that will interest her/him.
The introduction takes you through the basic vocabulary and how to go about organizing the project you want to do.

Here two examples of the workshops included in this book.

Workshop #1
This workshop asks students to observe and analyze school lunches. What kind of food is eaten? What kind of food is thrown away? How much does the garbage weigh at the end of lunch time? Through analyzing the food discarded, ways can be found to decrease the amount of food thrown away. For an example: if the peaches are being thrown away, why do they keep serving peaches?

Workshop #7
This workshop parallels #1 in many respects. The student will look into waste reduction. How much trash is produced each day? How much does the trash alone weigh? What is the trash made of? Could any of the trash be recycled or reused? Finally , how do we reduce the trash?

The very end of the book helps the student to plan the best way to present the project they have chosen. There are specific examples showing presentations made with drawings, graphs, using a power point presentation,dramatizing the information, using photographs,and more. This section also includes web sites for further assistance.

I see this book a great resource for parents and children of all ages. Students could work in teams on the collection of the data and the presentation of the information. Teachers will also find this an excellent resource for assisting students with ideas and the necessary steps from the beginning to the completing of the project(s) they choose.



If you are interested in having this book as a part of your own library you can find it on Amazon!


All opinions expressed in this review are my own and not influenced in any way by the company. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer or provider. Please refer to this site's Terms of Use for more information. I have been compensated or given a product free of charge, but that does not impact my views or opinions.


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