Y10 Controlled assessment Method practice Steven 10F

Aim:

To measure the slope/angle of the CCF field

To practise use of fieldwork equipment

Equipment Used:

Measuring tape (50)

Clinometers
Ranging Pole

Method: These are the steps we conducted in order to complete our experiment:

Our objective was to measure the steepness of the field in our school. To measure
the angle, we used two ranging poles, a measuring tape and clinometers. We started
by pulling the measuring tape the maximum, which was 50 metres then we put the
ranging poles 10 metres apart once this was achieved we used the clinometers and
measured how steep the field was in the distance given, this process was repeated 5
times for a distance of 50 metres. However the results we got from our experiment
is not accurate or reliable due to two main reasons: instrumental error where there
might be a floor in the equipment use or, human error whereby we could have made
a mistake whilst viewing the height or setting the ranging poles exactly parallel to
each other. In order to make this experiment more reliable and accurate we could
have done the following: repeated the experiment three more times as this will tell
us the outliers and the inaccurate results once we compare all three. Moreover we
could have got into two pairs (total 4 people) and used the same area, once
completed the experiment we could have compared our results, this is known as peer
review this method again illuminates any inaccuracy.
 Y10 Controlled assessment Method practice Steven 10F

7 The steepness of the field at 50M from 0>50

Distance 5 Degrees
(m)
0 > 10 4 5

10 > 20 3 6

2
20 > 30 6
1
30 > 40 5
0
40 > 50 0>10 4 10>20 20>30 30>40 40>50

Problems when conducting this experiment:

The ranging pole might not be vertical from the other 2 points, resulting in an
inaccurate result.
The clinometers might be used incorrectly.
The ranging pole may be dug into the ground, giving an incorrect reading when
using the clinometers.
The person reading could read it from different angles.

Conclusion:

From my conducted experiment I can draw the conclusion that, the lower the
degrees the steeper the field. However the results that we came up with may not
be reliable or accurate, due to a wide range of ways such as: differentiation in the
way 2 people look at the ranging pole, the accuracy of the ranging pole being vertical
to other poles etc. We have practised using three main equipment in this
experiment: a measuring tape, clinometers and a ranging pole. Overall I believe that
this experiment was interesting and beneficial for us, I also think that the main aim
of measuring the slope/angle of the CCF field has been achieved successfully.