How to Conduct an AgriScience SAE

1. How to Conduct an AgriScience SAE The Science Workbook: Student Research Projects in Food - Agriculture - Natural Resources

2. Identify the Problem(What question do you want answered?) • Narrow enough to investigate • Of interest to researcher • May modify an existing project • Don't worry about title at this point

3. Formulate Hypothesis(what do you expect? • A statement to be proven or disproved • A scientific guess • Should predict a possible result • Search literature of other related research

4. Research(hit the library and the internet) • Contact university researchers • National Ag library, http://www.nalusda.Gov. • Use inter-library loan • Use note cards on books, articles, etc. • The science fair project index, scarecrow press, 1983

5. Design Investigation(how you are going to do this) • Controlled experiment is most common • Use control group & experimental group • Anticipate sources of experimental error • Have adequate subjects in each group • Repeat the experiment 2-3 times • Follow guidelines for care & use of lab animals

6. Write Proposal(tell your teacher what you are doing) • Write out a statement about the: • Problem • Your hypothesis • What you found in the literature • The design of your experiment • Get feedback from your teacher • Get feedback from university researchers

7. Collect Data(record your observations) • Record data into prepared tables • Record non-statistical data in notebook • Report data - mean, median, and mode • Standard deviation will show extreme values

8. Draw Conclusions (what this data means) • Accept or reject your hypothesis • What is relationship of the variables?

9. Write Report (Becoming a scientific author) • Abstract (condense paper to a one page) • Introduction • Background • Statement of problem • Hypothesis • Experimental design • Analysis (include tables & graphs) • Conclusions • References