Our primary science curriculum aims to enable children to test and develop their own ideas. The strand Working Scientifically focuses on developing the skills that are necessary to do so.

Among the skills listed in this strand are those that are needed in order to design and conduct an investigation. An investigation is a fair test.

The central feature of an investigation is that you always change something and measure/observe the effect of that change on something else.

Here are some examples.
 

Change
Measure/Observe
The angle of a ramp down which you're launching a toy car The distance the car travels
 
The distance between a torch and an object on which it's shining The height of the shadow
 
The size of a parachute The lenght off time it takes to fall to the ground

With primary school children, the concept of a fair test should be central to all investigations. It is important to change one thing and measure the effect of that change while keeping everything else the same. If you change more than one thing at a time, then you won’t know which of the changes you’re making is responsible for any patterns you notice in your measurements.
 

In order to raise the children’s awareness of this, you might play the following simple ‘warm-up’ game. It involves the teacher demonstrating an investigation in which he/she deliberately changes more than one thing, thereby making the test unfair. The children are asked to raise their hands when they notice they teacher doing anything unfair. 

For example, when investigating how the angle of the ramp affects the distance the car travels, the teacher might 
  • Push the car down the ramp on one occasion and on another occasion, just let it go. 
  • Let the car go from the top of the ramp on one occasion and on another occasion, let it go from half-way down
  • Let the car run on to carpet on one occasion and on to tiles on another.

    •  

When conducting an investigation, the children have to make decisions about

The real value is in the process and in the decisions that children have to make.
It is important to leave as much of the decision-making to the children as is possible.

For obvious reasons, the teacher will have decided in advance that the children’s investigations will centre on a particular topic/phenomenon. Within those parameters, however, it is still possible to have the children investigating their own ideas.

Example
Recently, I was working with a 5th class with whom I wanted to do some investigating.

The aim of the lesson was to develop their investigating skills. I brought in toy cars and ‘ramps’ made from p.v.c. cladding and guttering. I had figured that the most valuable activity would involve the children investigating the relation between the height or length of the ramp and the distance the car travelled. I let the children play with/explore the materials for 5 minutes or so. I then asked them to see how they could make the car go as far as possible. After another 5 minutes or so, I asked the children to put the materials aside for a few minutes while we had a whole-class discussion. I asked them to tell me about how they could change the way they launched the car. The children made the following suggestions, which I recorded on the blackboard.

They told me that they could change


I told the children that each group (of 3) was to plan its own investigation. They had to decide which of the things listed on the board they would change. I had decided in advance what I wanted them to measure, the distance the car travelled. The children still had a lot of collaborating and decision-making to do, however. They had to make decisions about all of the other items listed on the previous page. They also had to predict the outcome of the investigation. All of this served to deepen the children’s sense of ownership of the activity.

One very useful way in which to launch an investigation is with a starter question.

Earlier this year, I wanted a class to investigate some properties of different materials. I brought in an old pair of denims, an old pair of cotton chinos and an old pair of tracksuit bottoms. I told the class that I needed a new pair of trousers.

I told them that my mother wanted me to get a pair just like my old cotton trousers, my dad thought I should get a pair just like the tracksuit bottoms and that my own preference was for the denims. I asked the class to help me decide.
‘Which material is best for Martin’s new trousers?’

This starter question, like those listed below, still left a lot to be decided. Each group had to decide what was meant by ‘best’. Some groups decided that it meant ‘most hard-wearing’. They devised a fair test which involved rubbing each of the materials with sandpaper. Another group decided that ‘best’ meant ‘quickest-drying’ and they proceeded to wet the materials and observe how each felt after 10 seconds under the hand-drier. The main point here is that a good starter question still leaves the children with a lot of decisions to make.

What follows is a list of starter questions for investigations in each of the 4 content strands of the primary science curriculum.

Living Things

Energy and Forces Materials Environmental Awareness and Care