From werewolves to body piercings — Camelot students learn to explore

From the November 22, 2008 issue of The Herald-Sun

DURHAM — More than 60 poster boards were on display at the Camelot Academy's 15th annual Academic Fair Friday morning.All students, grades K-12, participated in the fair, with the younger students doing the research project as a class and the older students doing the projects individually. Interesting and unique questions were posed, researched and answered including: the history of werewolves, film's role in the Great Depression and whether ethanol is part of the energy solution or the environmental crisis.

Amanda Stevens, who is a junior, studied the history of body piercing. She said she was inspired to research the trend after she pierced a second hole in her ears. What she found was that many cultures throughout history had body piercings for a variety of reasons.

"I chose six types of piercings, and there's a history behind all of them. In India the nose piercing, they believed, would help prevent child defects and help with child birth," she said. "The lip disk was worn by women in Africa to enhance their beauty. And navel piercing came from ancient Egypt, and only pharaohs were allowed to do it. Anyone else was executed."

Kelly Grove's fourth-grade class decided to incorporate Flat Stanley, a children's book character, into their research. They explained human body systems by answering questions related to Flat Stanley including: How does Flat Stanley use his fingers to type on the computer? How does Flat Stanley breathe when he plays soccer? How does Flat Stanley eat pepperoni pizza? How does Flat Stanley learn multiplication tables? How does Flat Stanley keep his energy to cheer?

Danny Sutton answered the pepperoni question by studying the digestive system.

"The most interesting thing I learned is that the entire digestive system is 30 feet long," he said.

As part of his display, he had a string on hand to show the length of the digestive system. He said he would rate the project at 10 out of 10.