SCHERERVILLE | Her blond hair tied in low pigtails, fifth-grader Maddy Martin fidgeted with her blue plaid jumper as she flip-flopped on whether she'd raise her classmates' taxes if elected president.

Martin lost the election to fourth-grader Roger Kaufman on Thursday morning at St. Michael School. Kaufman, 9, promised to find a power source that doesn't pollute.

Dan Johns, executive director of the United States Vice Presidential Museum, led the fictional presidential election. Johns has traveled to Kentucky, Ohio and New York, sharing programs from the Huntington, Ind.,-based museum at the Dan Quayle Center.

Thursday, he talked to students about the election process in a way they could understand.

He used ice cream to explain how electoral votes work. In a group of six student presidential candidates, five preferred chocolate, and the sixth preferred strawberry. But because the group could have only one of the flavors, their delegate was directed to buy chocolate for the group.

When Martin and Kaufman chose their vice presidential running mates, Johns gave them a few pointers. The person needed to be from a different state and should make the presidential candidate look good.

Kaufman, who aspires to be the real president or work in another federal government capacity, later said he felt bad he didn't choose his brother as vice president, but his brother wasn't the best choice. He chose a fifth-grader, thus expanding his voter reach.

Reflecting on her loss, Martin said she didn't answer questions in the debate so well, and she didn't really want to raise taxes.

Johns took credit for Martin's loss. He told the children that he was going to act as the media and Internet. During the debate, he rephrased questions to put her in a bad light. He prodded her for further explanation of her answers but left Kaufman untouched.

He wanted to prove a point that information sources influence the election process.