Science Process Skills

Science Process Skills are tools scientist use to:

• identify problems

• solve problems

•And answer questions “known” about our world

OBSERVING

Use your senses to determine the properties of

an object or event.

You must pay close attention to everything

around you and sometimes use instruments

to assist you with your observations.

OBSERVING

USE ONE OR MORE OF YOUR 5 SENSES

SEEING

TASTING

HEARING

TOUCHING

SMELLING

COMPARING

Identify common and distinguishing

characteristics of objects or events.

COMPARING

5 - HARD BALLS

3 - SOFT BALLS

2 - SMOOTH BALLS

1 - ROUGH BALL

3 - DULL BALLS

5 - SHINNY BALLS

CLASSIFY / ORDERING

Group information, objects or events together

according to their properties.

CLASSIFY / ORDERING

2 - BLUE BUTTONS WITH TWO HOLES

3 - BROWN BUTTONS WITH 1 HOLE

3 - PAIRS OF WHITE SHOES WITH LACES

4 - PAIRS OF WHITE SHOES WITH NO LACES.

RECOGNIZING TIME /SPACE RELATIONSHIPS

Estimate and / or describe how

moving and / or nonmoving objects

or related to one another during or

based upon a specific event.

MEASURING

You use the skill of estimation,

describe and record appropriate units

of measurement (quantitative

measurement) and make relationships

between time and space.

COLLECTING, RECORDING, AND

INTERPRETING DATA

Gather and organize data in order to make it

understandable (sense of), meaningful, and to find

patterns that lead to inferences, predictions, and

hypothesis.

COMMUNICATING

Use written and spoken words, graphs, tables,

diagrams, and technology presentations to share

and explain ideas and information.

INFERRING

Form a conclusion based upon what you think

explains your observations and data. Making

inferences may include cause and effect

relationships.

OBSERVATION OR INFERENCE?

THE LADY HAS HER UMBRELLA UP.

IT MUST BE RAINING OUTSIDE.

PREDICTING

You state the anticipated outcomes of new or

changed situations using your previous /

past/ prior knowledge, experiences, and

observations.

PREDICTING

I believe that the egg will float in salt

water and sink in fresh water.

HYPOTHESIS

Form and make suggested solutions to a problem;

from observations or events.

You will state in writing or verbally your solution

or explanation as the expected outcome of an

experiment.

IDENTIFYING AND CONTROLLING

VARIABLES

Be very specific in identifying the factors and / or

control the factors that might be expected to

affect the outcome of an experiment.

You will select the variables to be manipulated

and / or held constant.

IDENTIFYING AND CONTROLLING

VARIABLES

Want to determine if the rate of plant growth in salt water and fresh water will be different.

The constant is fresh water and the variable is the salt water. You have the same type of plants,in the same type and amount of soil .

EXPERIMENTATION

Write the step by step procedures (instructions).

These procedures will assist in determining

(decide) if your tested hypothesis is correct or

incorrect based upon manipulation of materials.

MAKING AND USING MODELS

You are developing a copy representing the

“real world” application you’re studying.

This will allow you to understand how systems

work and how they are constructed.

MAKING AND USING MODELS

Models can be a constructed replication

(3-dimensional copy),

a painting, a drawing, or a diagram

ANALYSE

Study the results / data of your experiment or

investigation carefully.