The Science Saga

We began working on Evan's science fair project early this year. I wanted him to do something that would relate to something he had already been learning about. So we chose plants. We decided to do an experiment to see which of the things that a plant needs to survive is the most important. Or in other words how long a plant could survive without one or more of those things.

I asked Evan if he knew what a plant needed to live. He did. "Sun, water, and soil." I asked him what he thought would happen if you took one of those things away. He thought the plant would die. I asked him which he thought was most important. He wasn't sure. We set up an experiment.

He predicted the one with no sun or water would die first, then the one with no sun, and then the one with no water.

We took pictures. We tended and checked on our plants for a week and a half. We took pictures at different intervals. The problem?

This is what the plant with no sun or water looked like on Sunday before the science fair was to take place on Tuesday.

Not too shabby, huh? Turns out marigolds must be pretty darn hard to kill.

So, now we needed a project that we could do in like a few hours. I asked Evan if there was anything else he had ever wondered about plants.

He said, "Well, I did wonder what those little lines on the leaves were." Hmmm.

After a quick google search I found the perfect project. I asked Evan what he thought the lines might be. He said he thought they were "leaf veins". I asked him what that meant and he said, like our veins that you can see in your hand. I asked him what our veins did and he said carried blood. I asked him if plants had blood.

He wasn't sure. he didn't think so. I asked him what those lines might carry in a plant. He decided it might be water.

And so the project, "How Does Water Travel to a Plant's Leaves?" was born.

We placed celery in red food coloring and watched as the water traveled to the leaves through the little lines and turned the leaves red. We researched and learned that those little lines are tiny tubes called xylem that carry water to the leaves of a plant so that it can use the sun to make food which is then carried back through the plant by more tiny tubes called phloem. And Evan decided they are like veins because veins carry blood to which gives our cells food and the tiny tubes carry water and food to all the plant cells.

Pretty cool.

And it turned out to be a pretty good project!

Evan won first place for the Experiment Category in Kindergarten!

(my camera didn't flash when Evan got his trophy:()

Evan's friends, Zach and Emery won second and third. All three from Ms. Fedor's class:)

His little friend, Hadley won a prize as well in a different category.

And his 3rd grade friend, Zach, also won a prize. It was a very exciting night!

Evan with Ms. Fedor

Congratulations, buddy! We are off to the County Science Fair on May 17. Wish him luck!