Irving School's Academic Fair
  
Parent and Student Support: Authors 

About the Fair 

About the Egg-Drop Contest 

Fair Rules

Registration

Types of Projects

Choose a Topic

Develop a Question

Answer the Question

Present at the Fair

Schedule for Day of Fair

Frequently Asked Questions

Links

Return to Home Page

About the Authors

This website was developed by two Irving School parents:

Eric Gyllenhaal is parent of a fourth grader at Irving and a sixth grader at Julian.  He has a Ph.D. in Paleontology from University of Chicago and more than 20 years experience working in museums as an educator, curator, exhibit developer, and evaluator.  He currently works as an evaluation consultant with Selinda Research Associates.

Sharon Bloyd-Peshkin is a former Irving parent (her children are now at Julian and OPRF).  She is former editor of Chicago Parent magazine and currently is a professor of journalism at Columbia College in Chicago.

The authors would like to acknowledge the many contributions of Ms. Valerie Brown, a former Irving and current Julian teacher.  She organized the science fair for many years, and it was her inspiration to expand our fair to embrace the full range of academic disciplines.

The advice on this site is based on:

• Our experiences working with our children on previous academic fairs and on numerous home-based projects.  
    
• An extensive review of the education research and related literature on science fairs.  Go here to see an annotated bibliography of that research.