Science Extravaganza Report Hints

Below are some hints that will help you with your first and final draft of your extravaganza paper. Remember that I will make comments on your first draft that you can fix for the final draft, BUT I will not make comments for missing sections. It is in your best interest to include all sections and do your best for the first draft.

Things to know:

The outline below is in the required order for the paper.

If you have a partner, you must do your own research section and conclusion. All other sections can be the same. I would like one final draft of the project per group, with that includes both research sections and both conclusions. Other sections can be done separately as well (you can have a different hypothesis than your partner).

The paper should be in size 12 font. You can pick whatever font style you want, as long as it is easy to read. The paper should be double spaced.

It would be nice to have the final paper in a 3 ring binder to keep it form getting wrinkled. This is not required though.

 

 

Cover page

The first thing you need to do for your report is to come up with a title. It can be as simple as just stating the problem, or you could give it a catchy name. So, you could call your project "The effects of colored light on radish plant growth" or " Light me up!". If you have a partner, both names should appear on the cover.

Table of Contents

You will also need to come up with a Table of Contents. This should be the last thing you do. If you have a partner, you are required to each have your own research and conclusion. You can either give them similar page numbers (if they are similar in length) or give them different page numbers

Bobs research section..........................................page 3

Janes research section.........................................page 6

Problem Page

The first numbered page of your paper will be the Problem page. The problem statement should be on a page by itself. The statement should be the question that your project will be trying to answer. It should include the variable somewhere in the sentence.

Research

The next part of your paper should be the Research. This is also called background information. Basically, you are finding information about your topic that may help you understand why you got the results that you will eventually get. So if your topic is to see if listening to different types of music effects your heart rate you should do some research on the heart. What does the heart look like? What is its purpose? How big is it? How much blood does it pump in a persons lifetime? What is a normal heart rate for a 12 year old? What might affect heart rate?

You can find a lot of information about your topic online. Be sure to look at lots of sites. A big mistake most students make is only finding one source of information and basically writing about what that one article or website is talking about. I you fall into this trap, you may be penalized for plagiarism. Changing words around to make something sound like you wrote it is not really doing research. You should look at several sites, find useful information, and tell me what you learned about everything you read. You summarize everything you found to be important in your own words. If there is something you find very important and feel that you cannot restate it in your own way, you can simply put the website name or author in parenthesis after the sentence(s). Just be sure that this is in your bibliography and do not paraphrase too much.

A good research section starts by telling the reader what the project is about and perhaps why you are interested in the topic. Then each paragraph after that should have a main idea. Using the heart rate example, the second paragraph can talk about the heart..its size, shape, location in the body and what it does for the body. The third paragraph could talk about why it beats and how often it beats. The fourth paragraph could talk about blood and what its used for by the body. The fifth could talk about interesting facts. The final paragraph should summarize the research.

The research should be around 2 pages in length at least. Of course, use 12 size font, double spaced.

 

Hypothesis

This page should tell the reader what you think will happen and why. Remember, that you do not lose ANY points if your hypothesis is wrong. You can lose points if your hypotheses is poorly written or does not give a reason why you think guessed how you did.

Your hypothesis page should include your control and variable somewhere. Remember, the control is the experiment that you are comparing your results to. It does not contain the variable. The variable is the thing that you are testing to see if there is a difference. In our heart rate example, the type of music listened to could be the variable. Listening to no music would be the control.

Materials List

This page should list all of the materials that you are using in your experiment. Be sure to be specific and use metric where you can.

Procedure

This is a step by step "recipe" for doing the experiment. It should tell the reader exactly how you did the experiment. The reader should be able to look at your procedure and get the same results as you did.

Data Tables, Graphs, and Observations

Different projects might have different types of data. Most students will need a data table to show shier data. Some people will need observation sections to explain what they saw happen or describe the appearance of something. Graphs are a great way of showing what your data table is telling you. Graphs are NOT required, but are a good way of making your data section outstanding.

Conclusion

Remember, each partner must write their own version of this section. It should be at least a page long. You should start by restating the problem and your hypothesis. Then you should state whether or not your hypothesis was correct. Back this up by explaining to the reader HOW your data tells you if you were right or wrong. Include important data such as the averages. Include the actual numbers! Talk about differences in your data. How much difference was there from the control, was it a big difference or a small one. Then summarize your conclusion. Were you surprised by the results? The final thing to do is to critique your project design, techniques or procedure. Was there something that you realized you should have done to get more accurate results? Did you need to test more people, or start earlier? Suggest possible improvements.

Bibliography

You need to include a bibliography for your research section. I have included a link on the sixth grade page for a citation machine which will help you do the bibliography properly. I realize that it is difficult to cite webpages, but you should try to do your best. A few mistakes will only cost you a point. It is more important to have at least 5 sources. www.wikepedia.com and www.google.com are not sources.

Acknowledgments

This section is not required. It is simply a section reserved to thank anyone who helped you along the way.