Science — Project Information K >How Do I Choose A Topic? Good question! Your topic should be: Something you are interested in, Something you can investigate yourself. (For example: Volcanoes are interesting but you can't really investigate one yourse!f!) Your topic should be worded as a question so you can answer it by experimenting. Your topic should be something you can investigate and the results can be timed, weighed, or somehow measured. w > To begin, make a list of things that you are interested in. Then think of as ‘many questions as you can about those things. Your list may look like the one. below. Things T like: lestions: Baseball Does a baseball roll farther on artificial grass? Goldfish Can I teach my goldfish a trick? Paper Airplanes Does the shape of the wing affect how a paper airplane flies? Collecting Rocks Do most rocks erode in the rain? Can some rocks float? Bugs Do bugs prefer certain colors of res a es yy X*K/Step-By-Step Directions A chef probably has a recipe to follow in order to cook that delicious dish. You, the investigator, will have to write your own recipe for your experiment. This is known as the "Step-By-Step directions" for doing the investigation. You need to list all the steps, one at a time, so that ‘another investigator could repeat your experiment without your help. As you plan your step-by-step directions, you will have to be sure that your test is a fair test. Just like runners in a race should have all the same conditions, your experiments must be done with the same conditions. These conditions are known as variables What Do You Mean By Variables? Voriables are all the factors that have an affect on your experiment. There are three kinds of variables you need to identify in your experiment: Manipulated Variable: This is what you change on purpose in your experiment. It's what you are testing. Responding Variable: This what happens in your experiment because of what you changed. Variables Held Constant: These are all the things you must keep the ame in your experiment so that it will be fair. (Valid is the word used by scientists to mean the same thing as fair.) For example, if you were going to test different brands of disposable diapers to see which could absorb the most liquid, the dif ferent brands of diapers would be the manipulated variable, You would be using different brands on purpose. What would happen? The diapers would each absorb some amount of liquid. That amount would be the responding variable in your test. The things you would have to keep the same would Z