Summer Research Program for Science Teachers
Caren Cleckley
Bedford Stuyvesant Outreach, Brooklyn, N.Y.
August 1998
How to Keep a Scientific Journal
Learning Objective: Students will be able to:
Record observations of a living organism over a period of time
Keep a daily journal
Record data and create charts/table from observation [Content Standard Unifying Concepts- Change, constancy, and measurement]
Draw conclusions from the data
Motivation: Each group will get a dish with meal worms (tenebrio) in it. [Teaching Standard A- Select content/adapt curriculum to student needs] Each group will get different instructions about recording their observations. Some groups will talk amongst themselves about their findings, while others will write their findings. Each group will then give a five minute talk on the observations. Discussion should follow concerning the amount of detail given within each group’s presentation.
Development:
Elicit from the students reasons for writing things down ie. accuracy, organization, for later interpretation/discussion.
Tell students that keeping a journal is one way scientists record their thoughts, record observations and interpret what they see.
Have students perform “What can a tenebrio teach us about biology?” from the New York State Biology Laboratory Syllabus.
Have students do research on meal worms.
Provide students with a notebook and the meal worms along with the necessary provisions to take home.
Students will keep a journal for the next six weeks recording their observations of their meal worms. [Teaching Standard D- Structure time for extended investigations]
Students will submit their journals at the end of this period, and release their beetles into the wild.
Summary:
From notes taken in the journal, have students reach conclusions from their written observations about meal worms.
Follow-up:
After grading journals, photocopies of various days’ observations will be analyzed by the students for accuracy, organization, etc.
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