Observing & Inferring Science Activities
Teaching children the difference between observation and inference in science is vitally important. Use of inference is necessary for scientific progression, but youngsters need to understand that you cannot make definite statements based on inference, while you can make definite statements about observable facts.
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Boy in the Water
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The U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management's website have printable "Boy in the Water" pictures and accompanying worksheets. Give both to each child. The boy in the picture is in a pond beside a tree. A branch above him is broken. There is a goat near the pond. The worksheet has a list of statements like, "The boy is in the water," "The weather is cold," "The tree branch is broken" and "The goat will butt the boy if he gets out of the water." Students must put an "I" for inference, or "O" for observation by each statement. The boy is indeed in the water and the branch is broken, so those are observations, while the others are inferences. Discuss student's answers.
Edible Candle
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Cut a two or three inch piece of potato, using an apple corer, and square off the ends. Dip it in some lemon juice so that it doesn't go brown. Next, slice a Brazil nut into small, wick-size, pieces and, cutting a nick in the top of the potato "candle," push in a piece of the nut "wick." Later, ask your students to write down their observations as they watch--don't mention the word "candle." Light the nut and let it burn for a couple of minutes. Then blow the flame out and walk out of the room, eating the "candle." Later discuss with the students what they saw and what misleading inferences they made--that you lit a real candle, for example.
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The Colonial Coin
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The Learn NC website has a "Colonial Coin" worksheet freely available. The worksheet shows two sides of a colonial coin with some statements below. Students mark the statements as either observations or inferences. For example, the front of the coin has the word "Dei" on it. One of the statements says, "The Latin word Dei means God." Since this is a known fact, students can call the statement an observation. Another statements says, "The coin was made by deeply religious people." This cannot be known simply because the Latin word for God is on the coin, so students should mark this as an inference. Discuss students' conclusions.
Examples in Daily Life
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Using examples from daily life to discuss observation and inference can also be useful. For instance, ask the students if all of them ate in the school cafeteria on a Tuesday and were all ill on the Wednesday (which is an observation), what inferences could be made from that. Food poisoning would be an obvious inference to make, but a shared viral infection, or injuries from a student uprising, could also have been the cause of the sickness on the Wednesday. When discussing observation and inference (or hypotheses), it is useful to ask how the formed hypotheses could be tested. In this case, for example, the cafeteria's food from Tuesday could be tested or students examined by a doctor to find the cause of the illness.
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References
- Photo Credit two moons image by Jaroslaw Grudzinski from Fotolia.com
