Archives for January 2013

An important part of a science project is measuring results. There are many things to measure – weight, mass, volume or capacity, speed, pressure, temperature, time, distance – even torque. Thankfully, most projects only measure a few things, and most experiments guides will describe the way to measure.

Metric or English? When doing your project, you will need to know if your teacher wants you to measure using the English system or the metric system.

In The Metric System all units are based on multiples of 10. For example, a meter multiplied by 1000 is a kilometer, or a meter divided by 100 is a centimeter. The metric system is used in most countries except the United States, and by scientist worldwide. The English system is what most people use in America. Gallons, cups, inches and feet are all part of the English system.

What are You Measuring? The next thing you will need to know is what you are measuring. The basic measurements you’ll probably run into with a science project are:

Often you’ll need to convert one set of measurements to another. There are many places online that will help you do this. One table is found at: http://www.bartleby.com. The easiest thing to do, however, is to go to Google, and type in what you want to convert: “convert 1 foot to meters” or “convert 5 hours and 10 minutes to seconds” or whatever you want to convert. Go ahead. Try it. And while you’re at it, type in “24/2007” or another math problem. Sometimes you don’t even need to think!

WANT SOME FUN SCIENCE PROJECT IDEAS THAT HAVE EARNED BLUE RIBBONS? CLICK HERE!

You may not believe it, but elementary science projects can be great fun for a family. Science projects give the perfect opportunity to learn about the fascinating subject of science. Unfortunately, science has degenerated into a somewhat boring subject in many elementary schools. The dreaded science projects don’t help the situation any.

Elementary science projects should demonstrate the way things work in the world around us so that kids are fascinated! Learning about chemical reactions, creating friction, hearing pops, and observing fire are the stuff of great fun. But somewhere between the fun and the fair, the fun too often disappears. It shouldn’t be that way!

If your elementary school child has been assigned science projects, your biggest step is choosing a topic.

Yes, we know how difficult this can be. We have four sons, and have done more science projects than we can count. One year, we did three elementary school science projects and a middle school project. We’ve had more than our share of problems, and made way too many mistakes. But somewhere along the way, we started to figure it out! We began to come up with project ideas that met the teacher’s standards, yet were easy to do, affordable, interesting and fun.

Here’s our advice. Don’t make the mistake of being too broad and asking your child, “Do you want to do a project about earth science?” or even “Do you want to do a science project on electricity?

Before you discuss it with your child, do your homework. Find some specific projects that meet the specifications of your teacher. Then, describe the project in dynamic terms. “Gross! Here’s a project about how yeast has enough gas to can blow up a balloon!” or “You take the shell off an egg in this project – without boiling it! Then you can actually bounce the egg on the floor. Not in my kitchen!”

As you choose an experiment, keep in mind that many teachers require that a science project follow the scientific method, even when doing an elementary school science project. That means your child has to come up with a question, do research, formulate an hypothesis, list variables, test the hypothesis, report results and formulate a conclusion. (Did you feel the fun start to evaporate?!)

It’s also important not to choose a science project so complicated that the child is only a spectator. Find an experiment that allows the child to participate, to understand the scientific principles, and to have fun!

A couple of years ago, we took our best projects and put them into packages of science fair projects that will help you and your child discover that science projects can really be fun. We know you’ll find that we’ve done the hard part, and left the fun of doing science projects for you and your child!

Finding an easy science project that will do well in a science fair can be tricky. Many projects are either too difficult for the average student, or just too easy to get a good grade. We can help! We’ve got packages of easy science project guides that will help you get top marks from your science teacher – and from science fair judges.

The experiments in our science project guides have easy to follow, step by step instructions. They all use supplies that you can find in the supermarket or in a discount store. The projects are all fun to do, and lots of them can be finished in 24 hours or less.

Take a look at this list of all the easy projects we offer here at 24 Hour Science Projects. We know you’ll find an easy science project that is perfect for you!

• UNDERCOVER SNEEZE Does covering the mouth really help prevent the spread of germs? A really easy science project, perfect for an elementary school science fair.
• A SLICE OF ICE Does the shape of ice affect melting time? This LINKcool science project will help you find out!
• A STRAIGHT FLUSH Which toilet tissue is most biodegradable?
• A PINCH OF SALT How does salt affect the boiling point of water?
• VITAMIN “C”ITRUS Which citrus fruit has the most Vitamin C?

OR ADD THESE PROJECTS TO YOUR LIST!
• SLIP SLIDING? NO WAY! Find out which floor surface prevents slips most effectively.
• EGG-XPERIMENTING! Take the shell off an egg without boiling, and find out if water will go through the membrane. You’ll love this easy science project.
• DON’T LOSE YOUR COOL Foam, pink, spray-in, or rigid. Which type of insulation works best?
• HEAR, HEAR Are two ears better than one? Get a group of friends to find out the answer.
• A FLAKY SHOWDOWN Which brand cereal stays crunchy longest? You’ll love this tasty science experiment.

You’ll probably run across a lot of new vocabulary while doing a science project. Some of the things below will be required for your science project, and others will not. We recommend you print this page and highlight the things your teacher wants you to do.

Project summary: A group of plants of the exact same height is divided into five groups. Each of four groups is given a different type of fertilizer. The fifth group is given only water. At the end of one month, plants are measured.

Science Project Proposal – This is a short description of your science project. It needs to include your purpose, hypothesis, materials, and procedure. Your teacher may also want you to list the variables, and give places where you will do research. Turn it in as early as you can, in case it is rejected.

Purpose (Problem) – The purpose is what your project hopes to find out or prove. It’s the ‘big question’. What is your goal? What are you trying to test? That’s your purpose, sometimes stated as a problem.
The purpose of our science project is to find out, “What type of fertilizer produces the most plant growth?”

Hypothesis – An hypothesis is simply an educated guess about what will happen in your experiment. To form your hypothesis, take all the information you know about your science project question, and use it to predict what you think will happen. It doesn’t matter if you’re right or wrong; that’s what the experiment will tell you! In our experiment, the hypothesis will be, “I think that …. will make plants grow the highest.” Use what you know about fertilizer, advertisements, comments from a gardener you know, or personal experience to formulate your hypothesis.

Materials – This is a detailed list of exactly what you used (or plan to use) in your experiment:

• Four types of liquid houseplant fertilizer -Peters Professional® All Purpose Plant Food, Spectrum® Colorburst Plant Food, Osmocote® Indoor Outdoor Plant Food, and Miracle-Gro® All Purpose Plant Food
• 20 identical terra cotta pots filled with potting soil
• 20 bush bean plants of identical height
• Water
• Ruler

24 Hour Science Projects
Five fast and easy project guides with step-by-step instructions.

Teacher and parent approved!

Project summary: A group of plants of the exact same height is divided into five groups. Each of four groups is given a different type of fertilizer. The fifth group is given only water. At the end of one month, plants are measured.

Purpose (Problem) – The purpose is what your project hopes to find out or prove. It’s the ‘big question’. What is your goal? What are you trying to test? That’s your purpose, sometimes stated as a problem. The purpose of our science project is to find out, “What type of fertilizer produces the most plant growth?”

Hypothesis – An hypothesis is simply an educated guess about what will happen in your experiment. To form your hypothesis, take all the information you know about your science project question, and use it to predict what you think will happen. It doesn’t matter if you’re right or wrong; that’s what the experiment will tell you! In our experiment, the hypothesis will be, “I think that …. will make plants grow the highest.” Use what you know about fertilizer, advertisements, comments from a gardener you know, or personal experience to formulate your hypothesis.

Materials – This is a detailed list of exactly what you used (or plan to use) in your experiment:

• Four types of liquid houseplant fertilizer -Peters Professional® All Purpose Plant Food, Spectrum® Colorburst Plant Food, Osmocote® Indoor Outdoor Plant Food, and Miracle-Gro® All Purpose Plant Food
• 20 identical terra cotta pots filled with potting soil
• 20 bush bean plants of identical height
• Water
• Ruler

Procedure – A step by step description of how to do your experiment. Another person should be able to do your experiment again, just by following your procedure.

Graph – The words chart and graph are used interchangeably. We use the word “graph” for a numbers placed on a grid (or spreadsheet) like the
one at the right. And a chart…

Chart – A chart arranges the information (data) from your experiment visually, so you can see it. Look at the charts to the right. The first gives all the heights of the plants on the last day. The second gives the average height.

Abstract – Some science fairs require an abstract, which is a brief but complete summary of your project. It probably should not be more than 250 words. This doesn’t go on your board, but is in a folder as part of the total display.

Data – Data means information. It’s plural, so the absolute correct usage would be “The data show us that…” (Actually, one piece of data is datum, which you really don’t need to know unless you’re taking Latin or have an extremely pedantic teacher.) Your data will most often be in numbers, although if you were a zoologist, your data might be observations about the feeding habits of anteaters. The measurements of the plant height (the numbers in the graph) give the data for our experiment.

Analysis – When you explain your data and observations, you are giving an analysis. What have you learned? Why did you get the results you did? What did the experiment prove? And, most important, was your hypothesis correct? The analysis for the fertilizer experiment would begin “We discovered that the Miracle Gro produced the most plant growth. While water produced the least growth overall, it is worth noting that two of the plants died after having been added Peters fertilizer. Our hypothesis was disproved, as we thought the Peters fertilizer would produce the tallest plants.

Conclusion – Answer your problem/purpose statement. What does it all add up to? What did you learn from your project?

Application – What questions come up as a result of your experiment? What else would you like to know? If you did this project again, what would you change? How can this project help in real life? While we discovered which plants grew tallest, we didn’t test which plants had the most flowers, and would give the most fruit. This would be what we would like to see answered in our next experiment. We have learned, however, that it is important to use a fertilizer, and we have learned some of the best brands.