SCIENCE FAIR
Introductory Letter
Dear 4th Grade Students and Parents,
The Thurston Science Fair is coming up and it is a required project for third, fourth, and fifth grade students. The science fair is scheduled to take place on Thursday, January 30th. You’ll find the directions and the 4th grade rubric in this packet. To help students manage their time and make this project less overwhelming, I have split this project into parts that will be due on different dates. This project is in lieu of the January genre project.
These assignments will be due via http://classroom.google.com, therefore, they will need to be typed. On Google Classroom, there is a template available, if students choose to use it. Students will be able to use what they submitted for their final poster display. Below you will find the various due dates. Students will turn these in via Google Classroom anytime before now and then. I will be giving students feedback (and rubric scores) along the way on Google Classroom to help them fine-tune their projects. If students don’t like their score on that part of the project, they can revise it and resubmit it for a new score (up until the day of the science fair).
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Question, Hypothesis, and Variables: Tuesday, January 14th
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Materials and Procedure: Tuesday, January 21st
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Data and Conclusion: Tuesday, January 28th
The tri-fold poster is due on the day of the Science Fair, Thursday, January 30th. This will synthesize all of the components that students have already completed. If you are interested in purchasing a tri-fold, the office will be selling them.
During the school day on the 30th, students will be presenting their projects to the class. The format for this sharing will be a “museum walk” during which a portion of the class will walk around and view the projects while the other students are presenting. Students should be able to explain what they did for their projects and answer related questions.
If students (or parents) would like to view projects completed in other grades, they are invited to come to the Science Fair event at 6pm on Thursday, January 30th. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to contact me. Sincerely, Mrs. Scovone scovonea@aaps.k12.mi.us
Science Fair Project Directions
Choose a question that can be answered by doing an experiment. Do a real experiment, not a demonstration. Base your conclusion on the results of your experiment. Make your display so that someone who hasn’t studied your subject can understand what you’ve done.
Basic Parts of An Experimental Project
- Identify a problem in the form of a QUESTION.
- Form a HYPOTHESIS.
- Design an EXPERIMENT or procedure.
- Collect DATA and analyze it.
- Make a CONCLUSION based on data.
- Decide how to DISPLAY your project.
Steps
•Choose A Topic: Select a topic that interests you. The more specific your topic is, the easier it will be to decide on a question and design an experiment or procedure to answer that question.
•Create A Question: Think about your topic and create a specific question. Think of a question that can’t be answered with a simple “YES” or “NO.” However, make your question simple enough that you’ll be able to think of a trustworthy way to answer it.
•Hypothesis: A hypothesis is a good guess at the answer to your question. It is always okay to be wrong so don’t pick a question you already know the answer to! The format of the hypothesis should be “If (this variable is changed)…then (this will be the result).”
•Experiment: Design an experiment or think of a procedure you will follow to find an answer to your question. Make a careful list of all materials you use for your experiment. List each step of what you do so someone else could replicate your experiment.
•Data Collection: Carefully record data that you collect during your experiment or from your procedure. It’s better to have too much data than not enough, so keep a lot of notes. Charts, tables, and graphs can make it easier to see what your data is telling you.
•Data Analysis: Think carefully about what your data tells you, even if it shows that your hypothesis is not correct. Think about all of the data together, not just one or two pieces of data, especially if they’re very different from the rest.
•Conclusion: The conclusion is simply the answer to the question you started with using data as proof. Be sure your conclusion is based on the results of your experiment, survey, or demonstration
Display Board
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Title in bold, clear lettering
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Graphs, Charts, Tables
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Photographs
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Explanations of all parts of the project as shown on the scoring rubric
Scoring Rubric
Project Elements
Criteria
Points
Question
Asks a specific, measurable question.
___ / 3
Hypothesis
Predicts a reasonable outcome, based on background knowledge, using the format “If ____, then ____.”
___ / 3
Variables
Identifies the following:
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Control (the “standard” that the experiment is being compared to)
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Constants (conditions that are same between the control and the experiment)
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Independent variable (the ONE condition that is different between the control and experiment)
___ / 3
Materials
Lists all materials that will be used in your experiment. Includes exact quantities for each item used.
___ / 3
Procedure
Lists each of the steps needed to do the experiment (someone else could follow along with the steps and repeat it in exactly the same way)
___ / 5
Trials/Samples
Collects data from 3 or more trials/samples.
___ / 3
Data
Displays the data from the 3 or more trials/samples in an organized way (i.e. a graph).
___ / 5
Conclusion
Answers the experimental question using the data as support.
___ / 5
Display
Display includes all elements listed above along with a title and student’s name.
___ / 6
Presentation
Student is able to thoroughly explain what was done in the experiment to an audience and answer questions.
___ / 10
Total
___ / 55
Web Resources
The following websites may be useful in helping you come up with a project idea. Some of these ideas are demonstrations rather than experiments. Remember that you need to be collecting data (actual numbers) that allow you to compare different samples or trials and have controls and variables: