This year at the beginning of the school year at open house before school started. My older son's (7th grade)science teacher had an experiment set up at the front of the room. The parents were given an assignment to identify the independent and dependent variables of the experiment (plus there were other questions). My husband wouldn't do it because he spent 4 years as a science teacher and made me do it. I found that there wasn't a lot of information given in order to answer the questions so I just did my best and was probably over-thinking it. She never said how anyone did. She was just trying to assess how much help could be given at home by various parents. My son only asked for help twice in science and that was on earth quakes and fault lines once where the written material was very confusing compared to the way the questions were asked and one other time I sent him to ask his dad without finding out the topic.
