[Sam Cree]

When my boy was in Cubs, I had told him that most of the work on the pinewood derby car had to be his. Imagine my surprise when we showed up at the meeting and all the other kids had these beautiful cars made obviously by their parents.

Same thing with science fair projects at school. I found out after the first one that these projects are made not by the children, but by their parents, and painstakingly at that.

Once I got the picture, I did the same, although I had the kids do all the work, even if under very strict and specific direction by me.

Maybe they learned more that way. We did some pretty cool projects. One was on the local geology of South Florida, and involved trips to the Everglades and Keys, on rock collecting expeditions. Come to think of it, I learned alot myself on that one, I'm probably the only person I know, other than my son, that understands very well what rocks this area is made of, and how they came to be here.

[2Jedismom]

Well, that is exactly right! Matthew couldn't put the axels on his pinewood derby car, much less use a hack saw and all that stuff! He tells Steve what he wants, draws up the plans supervises the cutting and is VERY involved in the stages of it. He is resposible for the sanding and the painting and making sure it weighs the right amount...but he doesn't use a cotton-pickin' jig saw yet..

[ksen]

Are kids are in the Awanas club at church and they do a yearly "Awana Derby" which is basically a pinewood derby.

The same thing happens there.

The first year my kids entered I told them I'd help sand and I would put the wheels on but the design and painting was all theirs.

Jacob, who was probably five at the time, basically had a rounded block of wood with smears of different colored paint all over it. It was the ugliest car I had ever seen. But he was proud of it because he had done it himself.

We get to the derby and his car was the worst looking one of the bunch. But he didn't know or care and I wasn't about to let him know I did.

Anyway, to make a long story short his car ended up winning first place for his age group and barely missed out on finishing first in the overall fastest car race.

It was great. ;^)