How to Successfully Complete a Project Science Fair How to Successfully Complete a Project

What are my interests in science? Step 1 What are my interests in science? When I think about science, what interests me? Do I often think about how things work? (Physical science) Am I interested in how food affects the human body? (Life Science) Does the ocean interest me? (Earth Science)

Research (you will do more later) Go to sciencebuddies.org Explore the website and notice what areas interest you! (Life Science, Earth Science) FYI: The materials you use for the project are limited! You may supply any materials from home, or think resourcefully in regards to what we have available at school. This is important before choosing your project! Write notes for yourself:

How to choose a question! Knowing your interests will help you quickly design a successful science project. Write 3 or more specific ideas you are interested in:

1._________________________ Prioritizing: Using the previous page, number your interests. The interest with a number 1 should be the one you are most likely going to do in the science fair. Number 2 would be your second choice, and so on through your list. 1._________________________

Topic to a Question! It is time to change your topic into a question! Now that you have an area of interest, what do you want to investigate about this topic? Owl pellets are a topic of interest to me and they are important in regard to food chains, ecosystems, and habitats. A question to investigate could be: What species of animal does the great horned owl prefer to eat?

Your turn! Change Topic #1 into a question to investigate. Remember, it must be an open-ended question so you can gather observations and data during your experiment to prove or disprove your hypothesis. (IT CANNOT BE ANSWERED BY YES OR NO! )

My Question is…

Hypothesis The hypothesis is what you predict will occur during the experiment. For the owl pellet experiment, my hypothesis was: If the great horned owl eats one species more than any other, then I will find more mice skeletons in the owl pellet than all other skeletons.

My hypothesis Write your hypothesis based on my model starting with “I think” or “I believe”

Materials Materials for experiment Where I will get the material

Procedures Knowing your experiment is important! Part of your project board will be to list the procedures of your experiment. I expect you to write them in your own words, not copied from the websites or books. Be careful not to miss a step in the instructions! Being a scientist means you must be 100% on task!

Write your procedures:

Procedure

Experiment Observations As you are completing the experiment, you will be making observations. Depending on the project, the observations will be different. However, you need to plan for this BEFORE you do the experiment. Are you going to take pictures? Are you going to time the reactions that occur? Do you need towels for the mess that is going to happen and weigh the liquid? Planning is key! No experiment should be happening without a plan!

Plan for Observations:

Observations:

Data: Extremely important! Data for the owl pellets could be the bone chart and a tally mark for each bone found. Your data is your proof of your experiment. Creating charts, and graphs (line graph, bar graph) are great ways to present it on your project.

Research You may need to complete research on your topic for deeper understanding. Providing information on the great horned owl would be helpful to people to understand the owl pellet. You did not know what it was before you read the two articles and we watched the video. What information can you provide the judges and audience on your topic for understanding? Think like a teacher.

Conclusion Did your observations match your hypothesis? Basically, if what you predicted would happen, happened…your hypothesis is correct. If what you predicted would happen did NOT happen, your hypothesis is incorrect. THIS is what you need to state in the hypothesis. Then, extend it and if you were wrong, state your thoughts. I was incorrect for my hypothesis about the owl pellets. In my experiment, the great horned owl ate more moles as evidenced by the number of mole skeletons compared to mouse skeletons.

…Continued Even though my hypothesis was incorrect, I was only looking at a small sample of great horned owls. It is possible that at their habitat, there are more moles than mice easily accessible for eating.

Conclusion

Do you have a title? Title for your project: