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Scientific Thinking

Table of Contents. Riddles and Scientific ThinkingScientific Method. Opening Exercise. You are going to participate in an exercise involving scientific thinking.You are walking in the desert and find a man lying face down with a pack on his back, dead. How did he die?"I will answer yes/no que

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Scientific Thinking

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    1. Scientific Thinking STS

    2. Table of Contents Riddles and Scientific Thinking Scientific Method

    3. Opening Exercise You are going to participate in an exercise involving scientific thinking. “You are walking in the desert and find a man lying face down with a pack on his back, dead. How did he die?” I will answer yes/no questions only.

    4. Small Group Activity You will be given a series of 3 riddles, one at a time. One person in your group is the moderator List yes/no type questions on paper in a neat, orderly fashion and I will tell you the answers as you bring them up. The team with the least tries to figure out every situation individually wins. Keep your conversations quiet!!!

    5. How are riddles and scientific thinking alike? Try to make sense of data Data comes from our five senses! Data may appear contradictory Contradictory: Two things that can’t both be true at the same time

    6. What can we learn from this? Rule 1: It is often important to view a problem from more than one perspective. “Lateral Thinking” Questioning from the wrong point of view leads to little or no progress once the correct perspective is found the solution to the riddle is easily determined!

    7. What else can we learn? Rule 2: Prior assumptions concerning data are dangerous! Parachute riddle assuming he was wearing a common backpack Leads to overlooking the unexpected! Question everything!

    8. What else can we learn? Rule 3: Yes/no questions, properly formed, give us useful data! In scientific thinking, we call this a null hypothesis. Something testable It’s either right or wrong (no gray area) Helps with setting up experiments!

    9. What else can we learn? Rule 4: Details that do not fit expected patterns are often very important! Parachute riddle: No footprints around the body? Seems fishy… Could lead to a quick, accurate solution!

    10. Scientific Method General method for problem solving Don’t always follow exactly… Typical problem you might face: car won’t start Scientists don’t follow exactly either Let’s go through the basic steps

    11. Scientific Method Step 1: Come up with a good, scientific question How does _______ affect __________? Step 2: Google it (not really) Has it already been done? (save yourself time!) Are there any good clues about an answer?

    12. Scientific Method Step 3: Make a guess Take a stab at answering your question Include both the cause and effect! Step 4: Test your guess This is the trickiest part! Make sure you’re only changing one thing at a time!

    13. Scientific Method Step 5: Look at your data Do you notice any patterns? Are there any unusual results? Step 6: Draw a conclusion Answer your question based on what you saw --OR-- Step 6: Redo the whole thing Explain your unusual results with a new experiment!

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