Scientific Method and the Way Science Works

Lesson Plan - Get It!

Audio:

I'm sure you have many science-related thoughts floating around your mind now.

• Did you immediately think of things like test tubes and chemicals?
• What about space travel and the moon?
• How about the human body and how it functions?
• Did you think about technology and video games?

If you thought about any of those, you were thinking about science!

• How can science be so many things?

Start with the origin and definition of the word.

Science is a systematic and organized way of studying and understanding the natural world through observation, experimentation, and reasoning. It is a way of exploring and explaining the things we see around us, from the tiniest particles to the vastness of the universe.

Basically, science is a super cool way to explore and understand the world. It's like a big adventure where we use our curiosity, observations, and experiments to find out how things work. Scientists are like detectives who ask questions and try to find answers using evidence and careful thinking.

Science comes from the Latin word scire, meaning knowledge.

• What do you get when you study the world around you?

You get knowledge.

It Starts With a Question

Before any scientist — whether a chemist, a computer scientist, or a specialized doctor — sets out on a discovery of new knowledge, they typically do so with a specific question and procedure in mind.

This is where the scientific method begins. The scientific method is a structured process that scientists use to help answer questions.

Since there are so many areas of science and different types of scientists, not all scientific methods are the same. However, basic steps are part of the scientific method that just about all scientists take when trying to find the answer to a question.

This helps scientists stay organized and keep track of their methods and findings so they don't do the same things over again.

When seeking knowledge or looking to answer a question about the world around them, all scientists begin with the first step of the scientific method: the identification of a problem or a question to be answered and an organized method for conducting and analyzing an experiment.

The Hypothesis

That problem leads the scientist to come up with a hypothesis, an educated guess about what is going to happen when they put their question to the test through experimentation.

After this step, the scientist will check to see what research has already been done and assemble the best experiment to answer the question and prove the hypothesis.

Experiment Design, Controls, and Variables

The next step is to create a step-by-step experiment, complete with materials, a defined control group, and a defined test group.

Depending on your experiment, you may have more than one test group, but let's distinguish between a control group and a test group.

With most experiments, you are testing how something reacts to something else.

Let's say you want to test a group of thirteen-year-olds to see how long it takes them to notice the text feature has been turned off on their smartphones. You want to test this under a few different scenarios.

1. Take thirty kids and leave ten with text turned off on their phones. This group will be the control group since you're not doing anything special to distract them.

2. Take another ten kids and give them each a $10 iTunes gift card. Call them Group A, and the variable, or thing that's different about this group, is that they have an iTunes gift card to distract them.

3. Take the last group of ten — Group B — and, in addition to turning off their text, install the top 10 hottest new apps on their phones. The variable for Group B is the apps.

4. Put all three groups in the same situation (on a bus or just hanging out at home) and monitor how long, on average, it takes each member of each group to realize they don't have text.

Now there is a control group, materials, and variables for the experiment part of the scientific method. (Feel free to develop a problem and hypothesis for practice!)

Next, set the experiment in motion and carefully observe and record the data. The data is everything you see — all the information you observe may impact your question or hypothesis.

Collect and Analyze Data; Draw Conclusions

Once you have collected all the data in the given time, analyze it.

• Did it answer your questions?
• Did it prove or disprove your hypothesis?

If yes, you can move forward and write a report detailing your findings.

If not, you may want to re-think your experiment and try again until you do have a solid answer.

Review these steps.

• Still sound complicated?

Review it all with one of these two quick videos.

If you like straight-to-the-point, no-gimmick videos, watch the one below.

If you prefer a little song and dance number to help you remember, here's a fun one for you.

When you are ready, keep going in to the Got It? section.