Math Fair Project with a Six-Year-Old

So.....Math Fair projects were due today. The letter that came home had today's date in tiny little letters then LOTS of mention of March 12th, the regional event for winners. I don't have to tell you which date I wrote on my calendar. So SUNDAY (day before yesterday after a day of OM, church, etc.when I want to snuggle up with the fam and watch the olympics), I realized that the project is actually due TODAY. Now yesterday the OM team had its final dress rehearsal then I had something at church (plus, I ended up spending half the day at the doctor's office then hospital getting x-rays for a thumb that turned out not to be broken, thank goodness). But I digress. The bottom line is this: once I found out that math fair projects were due today, I had a very small window to help my son with this. So we got right to work.

Here were our barriers to the successful completion of this project.
1. We didn't have a subject that he liked (okay, so he liked it a week ago when we chose it, but now he didn't and had nothing to say about it, so I knew that wasn't going to work)
2. Since we didn't have a topic, we didn't have a title or anything to work with at all.
3. We were both tired and grouchy
4. My son struggles with some fine motor skills issues which makes writing in a confined space tough to say the least

HOWEVER, slowly but surely there was a Miracle on Granville Street. My son, the youngest of four, has a deep sense of injustice, of course, so he decided on this project: count all the artwork on the walls of the house, then see how many pictures were drawn by each child in the family. (I.E. Which kid has the most pictures on the wall) I mean, jeez, must we go there? Of COURSE, he has the least number of pictures. He's been alive and making artwork for the least amount of time (and remember the whole motor skills thing?). But he really wanted to do this, so that's what he did.

SO my child went to school today with a Math Fair project complete with graph and slash marks and math problem to PROVE just how unjustly he's treated at home. I'm trying not to take it personally.

But here's the good news. He did a great job. He really did. So here's the funny part. His brothers and sisters (we have two former Math Fair winners out of the two) took him to their rooms and showed him their certificates and everything and one of them even showed him the medal she had received.

So then he began starting each sentence with "When I get my medal..." which, of course, is highly unlikely. So THEN, I pretended to be a judge and asked him to explain his project. With big sighs and eye rolls, he told me in a monotone what he did and why and how his brothers and sisters all had more artwork up than him. He said it's "because they're older" and actually made quotation marks with his fingers which was hilarious to me because I have no idea where he got that. Anyway, THEN he said, "How many judges do I have to talk to?"

"Just a few," I said.

"All day long?" he asked.

"No, just for a few minutes," I answered.

"Before or after the medal?" He asked.

Oh, my, there's gonna be trouble in River City. "Before SOMEONE gets the medal. It might be you and it might not."

"Then I won't have to talk to judges again?"

"Well, if you get a medal, you'll go on to regionals, and there will be judges there." I'm thinking there's no way he's going to regionals, or at least highly unlikely.

So he says,"Here's what I'll do. After I get my medal, I'll say no thank you to any more judges."


Should be an interesting day. I'll update you on the results tomorrow. Hopefully, there won't be any crying involved...

And my 9 year-old's OM team has their dress rehearsal today! I can't wait to see my eldest son wearing a kilt and dancing an Irish jig. Hope your day is exciting, too!