 |
Explore the steps of the scientific method at the following sites: |
 |
Jenny's Plants Jenny likes to grow plants, she has read every book in the school library on plants, she loves helping her grandma in her garden. She learned that most plants grow best with a fertilizer but it doesn't say which fertilizer is best. So she decides to find out "What plant fertilizer works the best?" She goes to the store and buys 2 of the most popular fertilizers"Rapid Grow" and "Miracle Growth". Mean time her grandmother told her that she soaks eggshells in water, then uses that water to water the plants. Jenny decides to read a little more to find out what nutrients plants need to grow. She found out "nitrates" are very import. After reading the backs of the labels, she thinks that Miracle Growth will work the best. She then plants 3 plants all the exact same way. She puts them next to each other in the window sill. She waters all the plants the same amount each day. However each plant gets fertilizer accordingly to the directions on the package, or according to the directions her grandmother gave her. The plant with the Miracle Growth came up first, but the other two came up the next day. She measured each plant every day. She recorded the height of each plant in a journal. She was amazed that after the 2nd week the plant that used her grandmother's secret was not only growing taller, but had more leaves and was much greener and stronger. She decided she better figure out what was in those egg shells that worked so well. So she went back to the library to get more information. She made graphs of her results, and continued to measure for another week. Although the plant fertilized with Miracle Growth grew better then the one with Rapid Grow, it was not as tall and healthy as the plant with her grandmothers secret. She there decided that their was something in the egg shells, or perhaps the slimy stuff left in the egg shells that caused the plants to grow better. |
James' Boxes James wanted to mail a clay sculptor of a tiger he made in art class to his grandmother for Christmas. He was very worried about it breaking, so he decided to test what packaging material would work the best. He first went to the web site of several packaging companies like FedEx and Ups to see what packaging material worked the best. He found that most people used bubble rap or Styrofoam chips, known as popcorn. Some people told him that all that new stuff doesn't work as well as old fashion straw. He decided to rap an egg in each of the materials then place the egg in a box, then roll an egg down his basement. He would see if any one broke. He guessed the best material would be the bubble wrap. James carefully wrapped each egg. He put them in the same size boxes. He rolled each down the steps gently, all of them survived. He then rolled each down a little harder, once again they all survived. He then throw them down. This time the straw egg broke. The other two survived. He continued throwing the other two several more times, simulating the long trip his package would have to make. Finally he examined each egg carefully, he found that the one in the Styrofoam popcorn had a small crack even though it didn't technically break. He decided to use the bubble wrap to send the package to his grandmother |
 |