May 26, 2026 Losia Lagisz

Outreach Report: Canada-Wide Science Fair Students Visit COSSEE/I-DEEL to Learn About Reproducibility

Twenty-four Canada-Wide Science Fair finalists joined COSSEE and I-DEEL for a hands-on LEGO® workshop on transparency, reproducibility, and why the small details matter in science.

On May 26, 2026, COSSEE and I-DEEL welcomed a group of 24 Canada-Wide Science Fair finalists (Grades 7–12) for a one-hour hands-on workshop as part of the University of Alberta’s Lab Session Program.

Canada-Wide Science Fair finalists collaborating around a table covered with LEGO bricks and worksheets. — Twenty-four science fair finalists got straight to work in the COSSEE space.

The activity

Our session, Building Science with LEGO®: Why Details Matter, introduced students to the importance of research transparency, reproducibility, and scientific methodology through collaborative LEGO®-based activities.

Slide explaining that each group gets a slightly different bag of LEGO and instructions, builds a small model, and leaves directions for another group to replicate it, all for fun. — How it worked: each group received a slightly different bag of LEGO® and instructions, built a small model, and left written directions for another group to replicate it. Best of all, it was purely for fun, with nothing graded.

Students' hands building small LEGO models next to worksheets and a bag of bricks. — Reconstructing a model from another group's written directions.

Why details matter

Participants worked together to explore how small details in research design, methods, materials, and documentation can influence the reliability and reproducibility of scientific findings. Using LEGO® as a creative and accessible medium, abstract concepts were made tangible and engaging, helping students connect fundamental research principles to broader scientific challenges.

Illustration of a student thinking 'It is really helpful! But what does this have to do with science?' — The pivot from play to principle: what does building with LEGO® have to do with science?

Slide prompting students to compare photos of the original builds and their replications, asking whether they are the same or different. — Time to put the directions to the test, comparing each original build against its replication.

Side-by-side photos of an original LEGO model and a group's attempted replication, shown from the front and the back. — Original versus replication. Where the instructions skipped a detail, the second build came out different, exactly the way gaps in methods or documentation make real studies hard to reproduce.

Looking ahead

We greatly enjoyed welcoming these young scientists to the COSSEE space and hope they left feeling inspired by the possibilities that scientific research offers. We also appreciated the opportunity to share why transparency and reproducibility are essential for building trustworthy science.

Students writing notes on worksheets beside their LEGO builds. — Writing it down. Clear documentation is what lets someone else reproduce a build, or a study.

We hope the experience sparked further interest in research, Open Science, and future studies at the University of Alberta.