3+PROCESS

Steps involved in Scientific Method
a. **Identify a Problem for investigation ** b. **Background **: A general introduction to the topic of study which includes the key findings or factors that lead you to what you decided to study. c. **Hypothesis **: A statement or two about what you believe will be the outcome of what you are testing. d. **Methods **: Describe in detail the protocol(s) used to test your hypothesis. A person reading your research paper should be able to repeat your experiments completely on the basis of what is written in this section. e. **Results **: Describe the data that you obtained from your experiments. In addition to the written text, photos, tables, figures and graphs are good ways to help present your data to the reader. Don’t forget to express your data values using appropriate units of measure (examples: 1.29 cm or 5.8 mL, etc.) <span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: auto;">f. **<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: auto;">Discussion **: Explain what your data means. State how your experiments and data support or refute your hypothesis. This section may be the longest and most important section of your paper! <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; display: block; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: auto;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: auto;">g. **<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: auto;">Conclusion **: Was your hypothesis supported? Why or why not? What would you do differently? What would you do next?