Libby’s eighth-grade students learned the value of questioning their own hypotheses and predictions in the pursuit of truth and accuracy.

The Libby Middle School Science Fair, held May 7 in the high school gymnasium, gave nearly 100 students the opportunity to showcase their reasoning skills as they sought knowledge and information.

It also was meant to challenge their perceptions of what they thought they knew about a particular subject.

Eighth-grade teacher Shannon Ostrowski has run the fair for the last three years and been involved with it for a decade. Her involvement in the fair began with high school science teacher, Renee Rose.

“Renee is a true mentor to me and so many of our students,” Ostrowski said. “We want the kids, while doing their projects, to ask questions, to encourage scientific inquiry, test their preconceived ideas.”

There was no doubt that occurred for the 74 students who entered projects. They were judged by 20 individuals of all ages. The goal was to make the Top 10, which follows below.

Teagan James: News Check

Simeon Shattuck: Ripeness on Hold

Sawyer Wofford: Petrified

Nolan Winn: Sink or Stay

Parker Olsen: Stain Wars

Stevie Greason: Plugged In Plants

Sadie Stephens: PSI Power

Margaret Smith-Salter: Acid Attack

Kaylee Jellesed: Crayolas True Colors

Abigail Kirk: Jerky Jeopardy

“They were judged on the depth of their project and originality,” Ostrowski said. 

Thirteen-old Teagan James, an eighth-grade student, took a look at print news and AI generated content.

“I came across a news article that I thought was real because of the way it was written, but after some fact checking, it turned out to be AI generated,” James said.

He said the story was about four-day school weeks and James was interested in it because Troy Public Schools utilizes that schedule.

“I wanted to see if three people from each generation could determine what is real and what’s not,” James said.

James also included a family member and two teachers in his study. The quartet came from Generation Z (born from 1997 to 2012), Generation X (1965-1980), Baby Boomers (1946 to 1964) and Millennials (1981-1996).

His study determined those in Gen Z were the best at recognizing the difference between real content and that generated by AI. Millennials were the worst while Gen Xers and Boomers were slightly better than Millennials.

James also mentioned the articles generated by AI had more hyphens instead of commas.

Fellow eighth-grade student Victoria Nixon, also 13 years old and a member of the school choir, wanted to see if music affected how people focus. She had the assistance of 12 classmates. They each had to copy a paragraph from the “War of the Worlds.” Six listened to music while six didn’t and they were timed. 

The music choices included Katy Perry’s “California Girls” and “Fireworks” as well as Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song.”

Nixon said those who rewrote the paragraph while listening to music wrote faster, but they were also more likely to make mistakes.

But to her surprise, there wasn’t as much of a disparity of mistakes between those who listened to music and those who didn’t.

Sawyer Woodford’s project included squeezing the process of petrification down to one week.

“It’s a passion of mine, I enjoy fossils and the study of paleontology,” Woodford said. “I really enjoyed it.”

He submerged natural, organic sponges in levels of 0 grams to 36 grams in 100 milliliters of water. The sponges weighing 36 grams had the highest concentration of water without sinking to the bottom.

Avid angler Hudson Hannah, 15, decided he wanted to see which spinning lure was the best trout catcher.

He fished in area lakes after school between Tuesday and Friday. He cast each lure 25 times and retrieved the lures at a fast rate while giving the line a jerk during the retrieval.

Four lures were Hannah’s choices, including a plain gold Mepps spinner, a Kastmaster with a little streak of blue, a yellow and black Panther Martin and a red and white Daredevil type spoon.

The Panther Martin was the top trout catcher by a good margin while the Mepps was second, the Daredevil was third and the Kastmaster fourth.

Hannah acknowledged the experiment, “was pretty fun.”

    Here are three of the 10 winners in the Libby Eighth Grade Science Fair, held Thursday, May 7, in the Libby Middle High School. From left, are Stevie Greason: Plugged In Plants; Sadie Stephens: PSI Power; Margaret Smith-Salter: Acid Attack. (Courtesy photo)
  

    Here are five of the 10 winners in the Libby Eighth Grade Science Fair, held Thursday, May 7, in the Libby Middle High School. From left, are Teagan James: News Check; Simeon Shattuck: Ripeness on Hold; Sawyer Wofford: Petrified; Nolan Winn: Sink or Stay; and Parker Olsen: Stain Wars. (Courtesy photo)
  

Libby Middle School student Victoria Nixon displays her Eighth Grade Science Fair project May 7 in the Ralph Tate Gymnasium. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)

    Libby Middle School student Heath Olsen displays his Eighth Grade Science Fair project May 7 in the Ralph Tate Gymnasium. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)
  

    Libby Middle School student Westin Remp displays his Eighth Grade Science Fair project May 7 in the Ralph Tate Gymnasium. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)
  

    Libby Middle School student Teagan James displays his Eighth Grade Science Fair project May 7 in the Ralph Tate Gymnasium. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)
  

    Libby Middle School student Sawyer Wofford displays his Eighth Grade Science Fair project May 7 in the Ralph Tate Gymnasium. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)