2: The Scientific Method
- Page ID
- 547115
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- Learn to work with a group effectively in the laboratory.
- Learn how to write a testable research question or hypothesis.
- Learn to recognize different types of variables in a scientific experiment.
INTRODUCTION
In lab this week you will work with your team to conduct a very simple experiment following The Scientific Method. This activity serves as an introduction to the process of refining a vague prompt to a testable research question or hypothesis and designing and experiment to test that question or hypothesis.
In order to carry out an experiment, you will need to understand the terms Independent Variable, Dependent Variable, and Confounding (sometimes called Control) variables.
Your instructor will likely discuss this with you, here is a short video that provides a nice explanation.
1) There are no significant safety hazards in this experiment.
PROCEDURE
- On a new page, write the date (upper right) and Title (middle) of your experiment. (Your pages should already be numbered.)
- Write the header "Group Members" and list the names of each member of the group.
- Write the header "Experiment Prompt" in your lab notebook.
- As a team, select one of the following prompts for your investigation. Copy the prompt text into your lab notebook.
- Is a tennis ball or racquetball better at bouncing?
- How long does it take to fill a beaker with deionized water?
- Which is bigger, a beaker or an Erlenmeyer flask?
- Make a table in your notebook that looks like the following.
Table 1: Experiment Design Template Dependent Variable Independent Variable Confounding variables Research Question or Hypothesis - Through discussions with your team, refine your prompt into a testable research question or hypothesis, including identifying relevant variables.
- The "Dependent Variable" is what you will be measuring in your experiment.
- The "Independent Variable" is what you will be changing about your experiment to affect the Dependent Variable.
- The "Confounding Variable" are those which could effect your result, but you don't want them to, so you will "Control" these variables to make sure they do not change.
- Your Research Question or Hypothesis, then, can be formulated with this in mind. Make sure that it is easily tested using the above variables.
- STOP - before proceeding, call your instructor over to discuss and get feedback on your work so far
- Write the header "Procedure" in your lab notebook.
- Under procedure heading, write a procedure for an experiment that will allow you to test your research question or hypothesis. Think of it like writing the step-by-step instructions you see in a cookie recipe.
- Leave a little space in case you need to edit or add to your procedure, then write the header "Obeservations" in your lab notebook.
- Look through your procedure and discuss what data you are planning to collect. Make a table to record this data under the observations heading.
- STOP - before proceeding, call your instructor over to discuss and get feedback on your work so far
- Follow your experimental procedure entering observations in the correct section. You may want to take pictures as you work for later reference or use in a presentation.
- Write the header "Conclusion/Discussion" then write a 2-4 sentence summary of your findings.
- Write the header "Member Contributions", write down the contributions made by each group member.
- Fill out the Table of Contents with this experiment's Page Numbers, Title, and Date.
- Scan and upload to the assignment on Canvas.
The Experimental Design Template by Eric Person from his Zoo Labs curriculum has been adapted with permission under the CC BY NC 4.0(opens in new window) licence.