Science Fair Thursday, March 10th

Science Fair Thursday, March 10th

Project Due Dates Project Topic/Question approved Parent/Student Compact Research and Hypothesis Due Friday, 2/10 Due Friday, 2/10 Due Friday, 2/17 Plan: Materials List/ Procedures Due Friday, 2/24 Final Experiment and Backboard Due Monday, 3/3

After School Meetings Lab/work time will be provided. A flash drive is recommended for saving work. Wednesday, 2/8 2:35-3:45 Wednesday, 2/15 2:35-3:45 Wednesday, 2/22 2:35-3:45 Wednesday, 3/1 2:35-3:45

Choose a Topic Pick a topic that: Will be interesting. You will be able to complete in the required time.

Question After narrowing down your topic, choose a testable question. Example: How does caffeine affect the growth of a plant?

Research Research should be designed to get background information about your topic, before you begin your experiment. Develop 2-3 questions that you want to answer about your topic. Try to use various sources for your research. Example: What do plants need to survive? How does caffeine affect plants? Do all plants need the same amount of water?

Hypothesis Make your guess Use your research to make an educated guess about how you think your experiment will turn out. Use the “ If then I think ” format Example: If I pour 100ml of coffee on four pea plants and pour 100ml of water in another four pea plants, then I think the plants with coffee will grow taller because caffeine will stimulate the plants.

Materials Make a complete list of everything you will use in your experiment. Tell how many and how much of each object used. Use metric measures only.

Procedure Design your experiment Design your experiment so that you are only testing for one thing. Make sure that you do the same things to all groups of objects being tested. Example: If you are testing plants: Use the same seeds. (CONTROLLED/CONSTANT VARIABLE) Plant all of them with the same soil. (CONTROLLED/CONSTANT VARIABLE) Put them all in the same amount of light for the same amount of time. (CONTROLLED/CONSTANT VARIABLE) The only thing that should be different about the plants is that one received coffee and the other water. (INDEPENDENT VARIABLE)

Procedure Write down step-by-step directions on how to do your experiment: Do not leave anything out! Use multiple trials (At least three.)

Procedure Example: 1. Get 8 pea plants (100 cm tall). 2. Place 4 pea plants on each tray. 3. Label one set of plants “Caffeine”. 4. Label the second set “Water”. 5. Pour 100ml of coffee (with caffeine) onto the soil of each plant on the caffeine tray twice a week. 6. Pour 100ml of water onto the soil of each plant on the water tray twice a week. 7. Measure each plant with a metric ruler. 8. Record data in record book.

Do your experiment. Have fun!

Collect, Record, and Display Data Record observational and/or measurable data in a table Take Pictures and/or print pictures that go with your experiment Choose the correct graphs for your measurable data. Bar-comparison Pie-percentage Line-change/time

Results Explain the data exactly as your charts/ graphs/observations show in paragraph form Example: From reading my charts and graphs, I know that Plant Group #1 grew an average of 40cm with 100ml of coffee. Plant Group #2 grew and average of 20cm with 100ml of water.

Conclusion Tell what the outcome was (consider your original question) Include if your hypothesis was supported or not (Be sure to use the term “ My hypothesis was/was not supported”) Think of something you could do differently next time (What variable you would change if you could do the experiment again?)

Conclusion Example: The Plant Group that was given coffee grew 20cm more on the average than the Plant Group that was given water. My hypothesis was supported since the plants that were watered with coffee (caffeine) grew taller than those that were given water. Therefore, caffeine has a positive effect on the growth of pea plants. This may be due the fact that caffeine is a stimulant. The caffeine could have stimulated the plant to grow. If I could do this experiment again, the variable I would change would be the amount of caffeine I would place in each plant group. I would use 50ml for plant group #1, 100ml for plant group #2, and 150ml for plant group #3.

References Include a list of resources you used to gather any information pertaining to your project Example: 1. Science Fair Project Guide. http://www.sciencebuddies.org. February 11, 2014. 2. Caffeine. http://www.uhs.umich.edu/caffeine. February 5, 2014.

Backboard Start your information on the top left panel of the board, move down the left panel, across the middle panel, and from the top down on the right panel. Place pictures of your experiment on your board.

Backboard layout Question Hypothesis Materials Procedure Data (Pictures, Tables, and Graphs) Results Conclusion References

Scoring Scoring rubric is provided in folder Will be used for scoring at the completion of the project Scoring Rubric

Helpful Resources http://www.sciencebuddies.org Best site for help through out project! http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/fair.html This is a good site explaining the parts of a science fair project. http://edweb.tusd.k12.az.us/jtindell/ A web site for children to use in setting up their science fair project http://school.discovery.com/sciencefaircentral A great site! It has info for parents, teachers, and students. It has project ideas, research tools, and tip sheets for all kinds of projects.

Begin With The End In Mind Keys for success: †Make a time-line and stick to it. †Parental support †Organization

Questions