SCIENCE
ETO
SUCCESS ACADEMY
DATE:____________
Preparing ___________________________ to be a Sensational Scientist.
(Name)
Topic: Reliability of Evidence
Pre-assessment
1
A basic principle for scientific research is that the experiment must be able to be replicated. What
happens when an experiment is replicated?
a. A scientist publisher accepts the experimental results for printing.
b. No one in the scientific community agrees with the methods or results.
c. Other scientists perform the same experiment and get comparable results.
d. The scientific researcher preforms the experiment many times and gets the same results.
2
Astronomers send probes to other planets to take pictures of their surfaces. An astronomer thinks
that briny water flows on Mars because he noticed certain features in one picture of Mars. Which method
did the astronomer use to form this hypothesis?
a. Reading scientific literature
b. Making careful observations
c. Analyzing a natural experiment
d. Conducting a controlled experiment
SC.7.N.1.2: Differentiate replication (by others) from repetition (multiple trials).
Replication and Repetition
Replication? Repetition? Aren’t they the same thing? The difference between
replication and repetition can be confusing! Both words start with “rep” and their
definitions are not that dissimilar. Read on to find out what makes these two scientific
words different.
So, your teacher tells you that your Science Fair projects must replicate an experiment
of a famous scientist or inventor. She reviews the ideas of Newton, Volta, and Ohm.
Then states that you may choose to replicate their ideas in your Science Fair project.
That’s great, but you’ve got a problem. You have no clue what replicate means. Before you can engage
in the Scientific Method for this project, you have to know what the word means.
Replication– the act of taking another person’s experiment data (such as Newton, Volta, or Ohm),
rerunning the experiment yourself, and comparing the data. If you end up with the same results as the
other person, you have replicated the experiment.
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The directions for the Science Fair project further indicate that you must use repetition while conducting
the experiment. You now know the meaning of replication, but what is repetition and how is it different?
Okay, you’ve chosen to replicate Newton’s 2nd Law of Motion. Great! So, the next step is figuring out
what repetition means. While inventors and scientists are usually pretty intelligent folks, they don’t run
an experiment once and “call it good”. In order to check the validity and reliability of data, scientists and
inventors run numerous trials of the same experiment with the exact variables observing the results to see
if they remain constant or change. Like these folks, you must use repetition in your project.
Repetition– One scientist doing the same experiment over and over using the same variables.
Perfect! Replication and repetition…no worries now. You are ready to start your Science Fair project by
replicating Newton’s 3rd Law of Motion comparing your results to his through running multiple trials
using the same variables showing repetition.
Your science teacher will be highly impressed by your project!
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Post-Assessment
1. The scientific community communicates its finding to the rest of the world by publishing its work in
scientific journals. This enables others to replicate and repeat other scientists’ experiments to accept or
reject the hypothesis and conclusions of others. However, individual scientists do not submit their work to
the scientific community before making sure they are right. How best can they ensure that their results are
valid?
a. Scientists hire editors to review their lab reports to make sure that their explanations are clear
and concise and to change anything that doesn’t sound good.
b. Scientists partner with mathematicians to check over all their data and charts and graphs to
ensure that there is enough data, but if not, they can add to the data.
c. Scientists repeat their experiments just a few times to show that they can get the same results
more than once and to catch any mistakes in the procedure.
d. The scientists repeat their experiments over and over many times to ensure that they have taken
everything into consideration to communicate quality results.
2. Astronomers send probes to other planets to take pictures of their surfaces. An astronomer thinks that
briny water flows on Mars because he noticed certain features in one picture of Mars. Which method did
the astronomer use to form this hypothesis?
a. Reading scientific literature
b. Making careful observations
c. Analyzing a natural experiment
d. Conducting a controlled experiment
3. Results in science are not generally accepted as being accurate until they can be verified. Which of the following is
an example of repetition in science?
A.
B.
C.
D.
A student designs an experiment on plant growth that includes multiple trials.
One scientist carries out the same experiment performed by another scientist to validate the results.
A scientist poses a new question for investigation after reading the results of another scientist’s work.
A scientist analyzes the data included in the published work of another scientist and agrees with the
conclusions.
4. A controlled experiment is a means for carrying out a fair test of a hypothesis. In a controlled experiment, all of
the variables that can influence the outcome variable (dependent variable) of the experiment are controlled or held
constant, except for the test variable (independent variable). Which of the following hypotheses would NOT be
tested using a controlled experiment?
A. a geologist’s hypothesis about how the Grand Canyon formed
B. a biologist’s hypothesis that use of fertilizer increase the growth of grass
C. a biologist’s hypothesis increases in average temperatures causes an increase in honey bee population
D. a geologist’s hypothesis that acid rains weathers sedimentary rock more rapidly than igneous rock
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5. Nina designed and carried out an experiment about light and plant growth. She displayed her results in the graph
shown below.
With the teacher’s approval, Robert chose to perform the exact same experiment. What was Robert trying to
accomplish?
A. A verify his results
B. B cheat on a project
C. C design an experiment
D. D replicate an experiment
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