Name: _____________________
Science Triple #3 –
7th Grade
Scientific Practices
Some students have designed a new bubble gum chewing
experiment. They are going to chew gum for 1 minute and
then stretch the gum as far as they can before the gum breaks
and measure that length. They are going to repeat the process
for two more additional minutes of chewing. Below is their
investigative question:
Question: How does the amount of time spent chewing a piece
of bubblegum affect how far the gum will stretch without
breaking?
Period: _______
Due 9/25
1. What is the manipulated (independent)
variable?
2. What is the responding (dependent)
variable?
3. List the materials needed for this
investigation:
Energy and Systems
1. Name one form of Kinetic Energy in the
person chewing gum system.
There are 5 forms of Kinetic Energy: heat, light, sound,
electricity, and motion
2. Name the location of the energy you
described in Question #1.
There are 3 forms of Potential Energy: positional potential,
chemical potential and nuclear
A person chewing bubble gum can be thought of as a
system. Use the forms of energy listed above to help you
answer the questions to the right.
3. Name a form of Potential Energy in the
person chewing gum system.
4. Name the location of the energy you
described in Question #3.
Content Review
1.
Cell Phone_____________
Matter is anything that has mass and takes up space.
Energy does not have any mass (it is not made of molecules)
and it causes changes in matter.
2. Battery ____________
Look at the words listed to the right. Place an “M” on the
line if the word represents a type of matter. Place an “E”
on the line if it represents a type of energy.
4. Lamp ___________
3. Light from a lamp _________
5. Heat from a fire __________
By Tami Port, MS, Yahoo Contributor Network
Jul 29 , 2009
Types of Scientists and What They Do
Different Disciplines of Hard Science
Have you ever thought about becoming a scientist? You are not alone! Science a tool; a
special way of investigating a question. When scientists try to reveal the answers to
questions about the world around us, they use a special process called the scientific
method. The steps of the scientific method help ensure that bias-personal beliefs, hidden
agendas, and just plain sloppy investigation-doesn't influence scientific results.
Although the scientific method may not be a riveting topic for many, there are certainly
many very cool scientific disciplines to study. When I went to school for my science
Marking the Text Expectations
degrees, my aim was to become a primatologist; a scientist, like Jane Goodall and
the late Diane Fossey, who studies the biology and of behavior monkeys and apes;
1. Number the paragraphs
as well as those well-known hairless apes, humans.
2. Circle key terms
Hard Science and Soft Science
3. Underline claim(s) – at least one
per paragraph
Don't worry. If you are interested in becoming a scientist, but primates aren't your
4. For each question that you
answer, reference the paragraph
thing, there are plenty of other "-ologies" out there. Scientific disciplines are
number where the answer was found
divided into the "hard sciences" and the "soft sciences." Although the boundary
between the two is not always distinct, the hard sciences are those disciplines that
are more quantitative (based on measurement) and objective (less colored by personal belief). For example,
psychology (the science of mental life) is considered a soft science, whereas neurology (the study of brain anatomy
and function) is a hard science. Here is a brief glossary of the main branches of hard science, each of which contains
many dozens of specific subdisciplines.
Disciplines of Hard Science
 Astronomy: The study of matter in outer space, with emphasis on the positions, dimensions, distribution,
motion, composition, energy, and evolution of celestial bodies and phenomena (like planets, stars, comets,
galaxies, black holes, etc).
 Biology: The study of living organisms. There are many, many subdisciplines to this science, including cell
biology, microbiology (microbes), zoology (animals), botany (plants), genetics (genes), immunology (the
immune system), ecology (relationships between organisms and their environment), just to name a few.
 Chemistry: The science of matter; the branch of the natural sciences that deals with the composition of
substances (atoms, molecules and compounds) and their properties and reactions.
 Geology: The science of the solid and liquid matter that makes up the Earth. Geology includes also several
subdisciplines, such as climatology, vulcanology (volcanos), oceanography, paleontology (fossils), glaciology
(glaciers), and gemology.
 Mathematics: This is a group of related sciences that use an abstract representational system to deal with
the logic of quantity, shape and structure, and the relationship between these concepts. If you can count your
fingers, you are doing simple mathematics, but the field is much more complicated than counting.
 Physics: The branch of science that pursues the study of properties and interactions of space, time, matter
and energy.
Can't make up your mind? Don't worry, there are also branches of science that are a mix of more than one discipline,
such as Geochemistry, Biochemistry, Astrophysics and Geophysics. Whatever your interest, there is probably an
“-ology” for you.
1. What is the difference between a “hard” branch of science and a “soft” branch of science?
2. What is Physics the study of?