Our friend Emma: Scientific Super Sleuth

A few weeks ago, I was contacted by Dr. Thompson. He's a scientist who has come up with a line of science kits for children ages 9 to 12. The science kits let children learn about what real-life scientists do by asking them to solve mysteries. The young scientists are given links to a secret web site, so they can check their results along the way and learn if they've solved the mystery correctly. It sounded like a great idea. I love to encourage science, but Arielle and Linnea are just too young. I asked our friend Emma and her mom to help us out. They wrote the following review:



The other day Secret Science Team member, Emma, got a kit from Ectropy. It seems they needed a super sleuth like Emma to do a little case work for them.

Emma carefully opened the box. It contained all the evidence and the supplies needed to solve the mystery -- find out who was behind a devious plot to steal, duplicate and sell pirated video games!



Emma and her two assistants took this case rather seriously -- they followed the directions and recorded their findings in the chart that was provided -- they even carefully returned the samples to their little baggies hoping to "be scientists" again.



When she began the project, Emma thought that she'd do one or two of the experiments/observations....





but then couldn't resist doing another,



and then another,



and then another,



until she had completed the whole kit and found her results --



we went to the website provided and confirmed that she was correct! Oh the joy!



Scientist Emma wants to share this with some science loving friends of hers -- it was a lot of fun.

Emma is 10 years old and in the 5th grade, her assistants are 8 years old and in the 2nd grade. They would likely have been able to do most of this experiment on their own, but they lack a certain *carefulness* that is required. I reminded them often about not contaminating their samples.

The Secret Science Team Missions cost $34.99. All of the products Ectropy offers are designed and selected to meet National Science Education Standards. This makes them great for home school families. The Secret Science Team line is specially developed for grades 4 -7 to encourage scientific exploration, analytical reasoning, and literature. Ectropy also offers science consulting, experiment design, and science kit building services to help home school families meet NSE standards.