What Does the Data Tell You?
Now that we have conducted our first experiment, we need to look at our data to determine an answer to our question. Carefully examining data, finding patterns and being able to explain them is what scientists call drawing conclusions. This is a very important step in the experiment process. I asked students to look at their data and determine what happens to the distance the car travels as they increase the height in their ramp.
A majority of students found that their car traveled a farther distance and that the car potentially lost control, curved it's path or traveled faster. I asked our young scientists why they think the car traveled farther distances when the height of the ramp was increased and here were their guesses:
the car has more power
the steepness of the ramp makes gravity pull harder
the car gets more speed when the ramp is higher
the car has more energy
the car has more force
From these ideas, students agreed that the car must have more force and more energy at higher heights than when at lower heights. We will be developing a lab later this week to see if our data continues to support the idea that the car has more force when it is let go at higher heights.
In addition to looking at what may have caused the car to go farther, we also decided to graph pour data to see if all students received similar data. Despite our best efforts in conducting a fair test there was some difference. Here is what the students reported:
the car slowed down when it rolled over the measuring tape
their was a problem with the car causing it to turn and move backwards
the car kept hitting the carpet causing it to slow down
the cars collided with other cars and we had to repeat trials
the car was broken- it would not travel in a straight path
Take a look at their graphs and conclusions:
