Payson Roundup | Payson, AZ

Half of the students at Pine Strawberry Elementary School participated in the school's science fair in hopes of taking home the grand prize -- a telescope.

First-grade student, Caleb Paine, beat out 64 other budding scientists, with his project on osmosis.

The hypothesis: An egg membrane will soak up whatever liquid it is sitting in.

Paine got the idea from a book.

He needed three raw eggs with the outer shell removed from one end and the membrane left intact.

"My mom got pretty good at peeling the eggs," Paine said.

But peeling eggs was the only thing she helped him do.

Paine inserted straws in the end of the egg then sealed the ends with clay.

Next he placed one egg in a jar filled with water, one in salt water and one in Coke.

He checked the level of fluid in the straws every waking hour over the next two days and charted the fluid's gradual rise.

"The science fair was fun and I learned that an egg membrane is semi-permeable," he said.

Other first-graders entered the fair with a class project.

Their hypothesis: Out of a group of 20 teachers, 75 percent will like peppermint tea. The students gave a survey form and a cup of peppermint tea to each teacher.

Conclusion: Of the 13 teachers who responded, 85 percent liked peppermint tea.

Students have known about the science fair since the beginning of the school year.

Junior high students needed to create a project as part of their grade and worked on their projects in and out of class during December and January.

Fair participation was extra credit for the elementary grades.

The osmosis and peppermint tea investigation projects are on display at the Pine library, along with experiments in bacterial invasion, a soccer box, how light affects plant growth, how the human eye sees color and a project exploring a horse's preference for apples.

Nick Schneider, a fourth-grade student proved his hypothesis that hand sanitizer would stop bacteria better than soap and water, but found the race was close. The sixth grade's first-place winner found the idea for her project when she and her sisters were looking at clouds in the sky.

"I said, ‘Isn't the sky a pretty shade of blue?' and my sister said, ‘No, it's yucky and gray'," Roggenstein said.

"My eyes are brown and her eyes are blue, so I wondered why we saw colors differently," she said. She created and used a color board for her experiment.

The people Roggenstein tested with blue or green eyes saw darker shades and those with brown eyes saw lighter shades.

Eight of the science fair projects are on display at the Isabelle Hunt Memorial Library, 6124 N. Randall Place in Pine, through Friday.

Judges for the fair came from Payson, Flagstaff and Phoenix. All participants received a medal and a free kids' rental from Movie Gallery. Prizes were donated by Sears, Movie Gallery, Sawmill Theatres and Corral West.

Science Fair Winners

First Grade

First - Caleb Paine

Third Grade

First - Konnor Widmann

Fourth Grade

First - Nick Schneider

Second - Emma Greenleaf

Third - Brandon Rodriguez

Fifth Grade

First - Anthony Magliano, Wesly Goldschmidt and Joshua Willams

Second - Hayden Jergens

Third - Rachel Davis, Sarah Sprinkle and Lanie Brogdon

Sixth Grade

First - Kalynn Roggenstein

Second - Shelly Schatz

Third - Lillian Rubio

Seventh Grade

First - Bobby Lombardi

Second - Weslee Sexton

Third - Bethany Sprinkle

Fourth - Dustin Bullard

Eighth Grade

First - Ryan Andress

Second - Kylen Taylor and Cody Marnell

Third - Collin Bellah and Dathan Atkinson

Special Awards

Best Display Board: Garrett Widmann (fifth grade)

Most Inventive: Katrina Kueny and Nicole Hallam (seventh grade)

Grand Prize Winner: Caleb Paine (first grade)