Chapter 2 Section 2 Studying Matter and Energy

Objective: Gain an understanding of the scientific process

Standard:

The Scientific Method is a series of steps followed to solve problems, including collecting data, formulating a hypothesis, testing the hypothesis, and stating conclusions.

A hypothesis predicts an event. A theory explains the event. A law describes the event. For example, the law of conservation of mass states that the products of a chemical reaction have the same mass as the reactants have. This does not explain why matter in a chemical reactions behaves this way; the law simply describes the behavior.

Designing Your Own Experiment With a partner, or alone, come up with an experiment. –Your experiment must be doable (i.e. you have to have a testable question…remember Biology?) –You must be able to collect data at regular intervals. –You will write up a formal lab report and share that data with the class. Remember publishing your results? –The experiment does not have to be ground-breaking, as I am more interested in you understanding the process. –Remember: Purpose, hypothesis, materials, identification of variables, Procedure, Data, Conclusion (which should summarize what you did, data, analyzing what that data tells us, what was learned from the experiment.) –This will be due at end of November with various checkpoints along the way!