Physics307L:Schedule/Week 2 agenda/Small group exercise

• Goals
  • Learn something about what makes "good" science
  • Get used to talking and contributing to class discussions

• Task
  1. Make small groups of 2 or at most 3 people
  2. Brainstorm about what necessary things you need to do in order to perform a "good" scientific study.
  3. After about 5 minutes, pick your favorites and email or txt them to me (txt 505-750-3279)
  4. I'll collect them and then we'll argue as a group about what is most important

Brainstorming Results

These are the items that groups felt important enough to email or text to me.

• Know the main goal of ur research
• Communication skills
• Data organization
• Keep track of what u do by writing
• Be careful to be precise and accurate
• Be creative
• Be curious about the problem. U discover more
• Don't be afraid to make a mistake
• Safety first
• Know ur equipment and how to use it
• Use your time efficiently
• Don't change too many variables at once
• Do a lot of planning, for good procedure* Transperancy, error analysis, citations, objectivity
• honest representation
• reproducibility
• relevance of work
• Design experiments such that the number of unknowns is

minimized

• Make sure no personal bias toward the results is
• Repeatable
• Can be observed and / or measured
• Is readily available to the public
• Asks questions
• Is patient
• Finds a reproducible experiment

present

• Open lines of communication
• Intellectual honesty
• Have a clear objective Have adequate controls Have detailed record of observations have properly functioning equipment Avoid any bias in measurements
• withstand rigid experimental disproof

Nominations for critical

These are the items that at least one student nominated from the above list. Student was required to make a little argument as to why. After nominations were set, we did voting. Round 1 was two votes / person, vote for any item. Round 2 was two votes per person, only considering the 3 highest from round one.

• Safety -- so you don't die
  • Round 1 votes: 0
• Adequate controls -- you won't know what you're measuring
  • Round 1 votes: 1
• Reproducibility -- If you can't reproduce someone else's work, what is that work worth?
  • Round 1 votes: 11
    • Round 2 votes: 15
• Objective / aware of biases -- so the work is actually useful
  • Round 1 votes: 7
    • Round 2 votes: 9
• Intellectual honesty -- if you don't cite properly you might as well be stealing
  • Round 1 votes: 3
• Patience -- if you give up the first time it doesn't work, there will never be progress
  • Round 1 votes: 2
• Asks questions -- without curiosity there is no science at all
  • Modified to "Asks the right questions" -- relevant / not getting distracted
  • Creativity
    • Ask creative questions that are relevant and answer them in creative ways that are most productive
      • Round 1 votes: 6
        • Round 2 votes: 10
• Sharing information -- to save time so different groups don't repeat unnecessarily
  • Round 1 votes: 2