Download the latest version of Adobe Reader so you can read PDF documents.

About Science Buddies

Organization

The Kenneth Lafferty Hess Family Charitable Foundation is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, non-profit public charity founded in 1995. In 2001, the Foundation began its sole operating program: Science Buddies. Science Buddies is located in the San Francisco Bay Area, but serves millions of students every year from all over the United States and the world.

Mission

Hands-on scientific investigations are acknowledged as the best way to teach science literacy. Science Buddies supports these activities by providing nearly 1000 free science fair project ideas in 30 different areas of science, answers, and tools to teachers, parents, and students from all walks of life. Our objective is to save our users time, while guiding them to a successful outcome.

By reducing the hassles of doing a science fair project, Science Buddies aspires to improve project quality and increase science fair participation, turning a good learning experience into a great one.

Awards and Recognition

Science Buddies has been honored with the following awards and recognition:

• 2008 Parents' Choice Recommended Award in the website category. Parents' Choice is the nation's oldest nonprofit guide to quality children's media and toys.
• Reviewed and selected for SciLinks, a service of the National Science Teachers Association
• American Library Association Great Websites for Kids

Visit our About Us and Staff & Advisory Boards pages to find out more about Science Buddies.

Privacy Policy

Science Buddies is in compliance with the COPPA (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act). To understand how Science Buddies responsibly collects and safely uses your child's information, we invite you to review our Privacy Policy.

Why Are Science Fairs Important?

A science fair project can give your child the first chance to design his or her own learning experience, one that allows him or her to innovate, just as scientists do in the real world. Students will be able to explore personal interests to select an area for his or her science fair project, as well as learn the scientific method to answer a question. Each student will also develop skills above and beyond science proficiency, such as:

• Reading Comprehension and Writing: Doing background research and writing a research paper
• Math: Creating graphs and performing data analysis
• Time Management: Planning a multi-step project
• Communication: Presenting and explaining the science fair project
• Ethics Understanding: Learning about plagiarism and the importance of credit and citations

For additional information about the value of science fairs, view these insightful Science Buddies webpages:

• Success Lies Beyond the Test in Education
• The Value of a Science Fair Project

Preparing You and Your Child for Science Fair Success

Topic Selection Wizard

Children have a wide range of interests. While some interests may appear to lend themselves better to science fair projects than others, with nearly 1000 Project Ideas—in areas ranging from Cooking & Food Science to Geology to Video & Computer Games—your child is sure to find a project topic he or she is excited about. After all, excitement and passion are what drive great projects, new insights, and innovative discoveries! The Topic Selection Wizard is an interactive questionnaire to help science fair participants narrow their area of interest. You can access the Topic Selection Wizard from the Project Ideas tab at the top of the page. Have your children give it a try!

Project Ideas

Science Buddies has over 850 Project Ideas in over 30 areas of science. Here are just a few of the interest areas we cover:

• Astronomy
• Chemistry
• Cooking & Food Science
• Electricity & Electronics
• Environmental Science
• Human Behavior
• Music
• Sports Science
• Video & Computer Games
• See the complete list

Ask an Expert

During science fair season, your child will be knee-deep in research and you may be bombarded with his or her questions! Science Buddies Ask an Expert is an online bulletin board you and/or your child can use to ask science fair and/or career-oriented questions. Ask an Expert is staffed by top high school science students and volunteer scientists from a wide array of backgrounds and businesses. We screen and train all of our Experts before assigning them positions as Experts. In addition, activity on the Ask an Expert Forums is monitored by Science Buddies staff, and the program strictly complies with COPPA (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act). Here are just a few of the Experts who have been available to answer questions:

• A doctoral student in mechanical engineering at the Stanford Aerospace Robotics Lab who specializes in underwater robotics
• A wildlife researcher and curator of birds and mammals at the New York State Museum
• A theoretical and computational physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, whose recent work deals with the design and use of high-power lasers
• A forensics expert who works for a state crime lab
• An expert in tropical ecology and conservation who studies, among other things, the effects of oil spills on tropical birds

You can access Ask an Expert at any time by clicking on the Ask an Expert tab at the top of the page.

Science Fair Project Overview

By doing a science fair project, your child will have the chance to solve his or her own science mystery. Since your child will have the chance to pick his or her own science project question, from the physics of making music to the biology of tide pool animals, he or she will have the chance to experience the joy of discovery. When starting a science fair project, a student chooses a question he or she would like to answer. Then, he or she does targeted library and Internet research to gain the background information needed to formulate a hypothesis and design an experimental procedure. After writing a report to summarize the background research, the student will perform the experiment, draw conclusions, and communicate the results to the teachers and classmates.

Through time-management and project planning, your child will take on the responsibility of completing a project over at least a ten-week period. Your child will discover his or her creativity by brainstorming science project questions and figuring out how to display the process and results. A science fair project, through its challenge to ask questions and discover, is truly a real-world experience in innovation, similar to what scientists do in their careers.

The Scientific Method

Science projects should follow the six-step scientific method. These steps are shown in the chart below. The Science Buddies Steps of the Scientific Method Project Guide page provides direction on all of the steps.

How to Help

Help your child meet their target dates by getting out your family calendar and marking the interim due dates. Block out times for trips to the library and other work time. Look for any scheduling conflicts, such as vacations, and discuss issues with the teacher.

As your child works on his or her project, he or she will likely face stumbling blocks. To help, ask questions to help your child figure things out; don't just provide the answers. Open-ended questions, such as "What else could you try to solve this?" or "What is stopping you from going on to the next step?" are best (Fredericks & Asimov, 2001). Sometimes, just talking it out can help children get unstuck. If not, ask the teacher for help. Respect your child's independence in learning by helping at the right level.