Ballarat students have conducted scientific experiments to answer some of the real-life questions they have often wondered about.
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As it turns out, electric toothbrushes are worth the money because they remove stains faster than regular brushes; Skittles don't all taste the same; and it does matter which flour you use in cupcakes.
Five teams of science students presented the findings of their research to a panel of judges at Ballarat Tech School this week in the finals of the Peter Doherty Science Awards.
Ballarat Grammar students Angela Sun, Mackayla Culvenor and Sammy Deacon took out the main prize with their experiment and research on the effectiveness of electric toothbrushes.
"We all own electric toothbrushes and were shocked to find out they can cost up to $500 ... but we don't know the science behind them," Angela said.
So they tested electric toothbrushes and regular toothbrushes, and the stroke rate of each, to see which removed stains faster.
Their conclusion - electric toothbrushes are worth the money.
"But we also realised electric toothbrushes have a lot of other components like bristles, the angle of bristles, friction ... which we can investigate in further experiments."
Fellow Ballarat Grammar team Lindy Zhang and Zoe Wright followed their tastebuds to bake their way to the PDSA Communication Award, testing the best flour to use in cupcakes.
Ballarat High School students Audrey English and Wheng Marbella were highly commended for their work tackling the urban myth that all Skittles taste the same.
Eager classmates helped test the hypothesis, with students working in pairs with one blindfolded and given a Skittle to taste and nominate the flavour of.
Yellow Skittles were easiest to identify, orange the hardest, while purple, green and red fell in between.
Both said doing scientific experiments based in real-life made the subject more interesting.
"Doing something that you want to know about is a lot better than doing something you are forced to," they said.
IN OTHER NEWS
Ballarat Tech School STEM educator Kirstyn Hall said judges were impressed at the calibre of the work and presentations from the students.
"On display at the awards was a genuine curiosity about the world we live in, how it works, and most importantly, how to figure out the answers to those questions," she said.
"The quality of the student presentations was high, but even more important was the outstanding teamwork and mateship on display with students working together and supporting each other."
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