Science According to KIDS!

Updated 08-07-07

These just came across my desk from a fellow NASA Ambassador, Rae McEntyre (rae_rpcv [at] msn.com)

A number of primary schools were doing a project about "The Ocean." Children were asked to draw pictures or write about their experiences. Teachers got together to compare the results and put together some of the "better" ones. Here are some of the descriptions of "ocean life."

  1. This is a picture of an octopus. It has eight testicles. (Kelly, age 6)
  2. Some fish are dangerous. Jellyfish can sting. Electric eels can give you a shock. They have to live in caves under the sea where I think they have to plug themselves in to chargers. (Christopher, age 7)
  3. If you are surrounded by sea you are an Island . If you don't have sea all around you, are incontinent. ( Wayne , age 7)
  4. I think sharks are ugly and mean, and have big teeth, just like Emily R. She's not my friend no more. (Kylie, age 6)
  5. A dolphin breathes through an asshole on the top of its head. (Billy, age 8)
  6. My uncle goes out in his boat with pot, and comes back with crabs. (Millie, age 7)
  7. When ships had sails, they used to use the trade winds to cross the ocean. Sometimes, when the wind didn't blow, the sailors would whistle to make the wind come. My brother said they would be better off eating beans. (William, age 7)
  8. I like mermaids. They are beautiful, and I like their shiny tails. How do mermaids get pregnant? (Helen, age 7)
  9. When you go swimming in the sea, it is very cold, and it makes my willy small. (Kevin, age 6)

The following list of kid's answers and thoughts were supplied by many individuals thru the net and my years behind the "desk". Special thanks to

NOTE: No attempt has been made to correct spelling and grammar. Submissions are as received to maintain some semblance of authenticity.


This one just came in from James C. Kernohan of Milton Academy in Milton, MA. [Jim_Kernohan [AT] milton.edu]
"The question ... read "velocity is change in ____ / _____" One of my students merged two ideas and came up with 'change in disposition/change in time'. His answer sure changed my disposition!"
-Thanks, Jim!

These just came across my desk today (05-02-07). Actually, I just found them again... hidden in a file folder under 10 years of junk... These are questions were actually asked to an online tutorial/homework help service. I can attest to their validity since I worked for this group for 3 years tutoring physics kids! Keep in mind, spelling and punctuation preserved...

The following comments were quoted by Richard Ledener, from teenage student science essays, exams and classroom discussions:

SOME MORE?

GRADE & HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT ANSWERS FROM EXAMS.


AND EVEN MORE!


Oh, My GOSH! Even MORE THAN MORE!!!!
  • Parallel lines never meet, unless you bend one or both of them.
  • Algebraical symbols are used when you do not know what you are talking about.
  • Geometry teaches us to bisex angles.
  • A circle is a line which meets its other end without ending.
  • An example of animal breeding is the farmer who mated a bull that gave a great deal of milk with a bull with good meat.
  • We believe that the reptiles came from the amphibians by spontaneous generation and study of rocks.
  • English sparrows and starlings eat the farmers grain and soil his corpse.
  • By self-pollination, the farmer may get a flock of long-haired sheep.
  • If conditions are not favorable, bacteria go into a period of adolescence.
  • Vegetative propagation is the process by which one individual manufactures another individual by accident.
  • A triangle which has an angle of 135 degrees is called an obscene triangle.
  • A person should take a bath once in the summer, and not quite so often in the winter.
  • The hookworm larvae enters the human body through the soul.
  • When you haven't got enough iodine in your blood you get a glacier.
  • It is a well-known fact that a deceased body harms the mind.
  • Humans are more intelligent than beasts because the human branes have more convulsions.
  • Bar magnets have north and south poles, horseshoe magnets have east and west poles.
  • When water freezes you can walk on it. That is what Christ did long ago in wintertime.


    REAL TEST ANSWERS???

    Here are REAL Answers Teachers have received on Tests and Quizzes of 5th thru 10th Graders compiled from various sources on the Internet AND a few of my own.

    SCIENCE

    1. You can listen to thunder after lightening and tell how close you came to getting hit. If you don't hear it, you got hit, so never mind.
    2. When they broke open molecules, they found they were only stuffed with atoms. But when they broke open atoms, they found them stuffed with explosions.
    3. When people run around and around in circles we say they are crazy. When planets do it they are orbiting.
    4. Most books now say our sun is a star. But it still knows how to change back into a sun in the daytime.
    5. Many dead animals of the past changed to fossils, others preferred to be oil.
    6. Vacuums are nothings. We only mention them to let them know we know they're there.
    7. Some people can tell time by looking at the sun. I have trouble making out the numbers.
    8. We say the cause of perfume disappearing is evaporation. Evaporation gets blamed for a lot of things people forget to put the top on.
    9. I am not sure how clouds get formed. But the clouds know how to do it, and that is the important thing.
    10. Coincide is what you do when it rains outside.
    11. Cyanide is so poisonous that one drop of it on a dog's tongue will kill the strongest man.
    12. Thunder is a rich source of loudness.
    13. It is so hot in some parts of the world that the people there have to live someplace else.
    14. H2O is hot water. CO2 is cold water.
    15. The spinal column is a long bunch of bones. The head sits on the top and you sit on the bottom.
    16. The blood circulates through the body by flowing down one leg and up the other.
    17. Columbus landed in Ohio.
    18. Carbon Dating is when an old dinosaur asks another one to the dance. [HONEST! This WAS on a quiz from my wife's 6th grade science class! HONEST!]
    19. Objects appear smaller in some mirrors because they are farther away.
    20. Newton got hit in the head by an apple. That's why he got mad and argued with Einsteen.
    21. Science is all around us. It's just hiding.
    22. A conclusion to a lav is when you explain why your answer is wrong.
    23. A human can withstand millions of volts, but only one at a time.


    HUMANITIES

    1. The future of "I give" is "I take."
    2. The parts of speech are lungs and air.
    3. Before there was people, they didn't write.
    4. A census taker is man who goes from house to house increasing the population.
    5. Water is composed of two gins. Oxygin and hydigin. Oxygin is pure gin. Hydrigin is gin and water.
    6. A virgin forest is a forest where the hand of man has never set foot.
    7. The general direction of the Alps is straight up.
    8. A city purifies its water by filtering it then forcing it through an aviator.
    9. Most of the houses in France are made of Plaster of Paris.
    10. The people who followed the Lord were called the Oppossums.
    11. One of the main causes of dust is janitors.
    12. A scout obeys all to whom obedience is due and respects all duly constipated authorities.
    13. One by-product of raising cattle is calves.
    14. The four seasons are salt, pepper, mustard, and vinegar.
    15. The word trousers is an uncommon noun because it is singular at the top but plural at the bottom.
    16. Syntax is all the money collected at church from sinners.
    17. In spring, the salmon swim upstream to spoon.
    18. Iron was discovered because someone smelt it.
    19. In the middle of the 18th century, all the morons moved to Utah.
    20. A person should take a bath once in the summer, less often in the winter.

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