Tonight is an optional third grade science fair.

In the past at our school the science fair was held in second grade. It was, in my opinion, ridiculous. It was mandatory and few if any second graders really had the ability to create a science fair project on their own. So, what you got was two “competitions.”

One competition was for those parents who felt compelled to “help” their children create a science fair project. Those displays rocked and the competition was about which display and projects were the best.

The other competition was for parents who felt compelled to stick to their guns and not help their children, even though what had been asked of their children was not developmentally appropriate. Those displays did not rock, so this competition was more about which parent had the best smug “I read parenting articles” look.

There were also those of us in the middle. Knowing we shouldn’t help too much but also baffled as to how our seven year old who can’t cut straight could prepare a display board. We stood around with mediocre presentations and only slightly smug looks on our faces.

When my son was in second grade, the science fair disappeared, and I rejoiced. Now that he’s in third grade it’s been re-introduced, but as a voluntary activity. I assumed that given the choice, he would not want to do the work or participate. I was wrong, sort of.

He wanted to participate, but did not want to do the work. He chose a project that he liked, and then ignored it. Over several weeks including winter break and snow days, he refused to work on it. Not once, but twice he had households full of people willing to be test subjects, and he was uninterested in testing them.

So what is my victory? My victory is that tonight he will go to the science fair with this project. This project that completely and utterly sucks.

I know via Facebook that a friend of his has created a project involving testing the effects of carbs on blood sugar. Also thanks to Facebook I know that another friend has been working on his project during his chemotherapy treatments. My son was not even willing to work on his project during episodes of Jessie.

My victory is that this project sucks. In the conclusion statement (which yes, I helped him write) my son acknowledges that basically, he didn’t do enough work to yield any info if any use to anyone.

But we will go to the science fair tonight. Maybe he will look around and think “Huh, guess maybe I could have done some work.” Or, maybe he’ll go and spend the hour or so running around the gym not caring what anyone thinks. It doesn’t matter.