I did a science project called “Shake it Break it”. My partner that I did the science fair with was Marko. We got a sliver award. This is my reflection. To see Marko’s reflection go to his blog.
The experiment went well, but it wasn’t that precise. We had no issues with materials we couldn’t get, and we had no issues in making fair comparisons. For example, we found a new way to test the paper mache by putting a piece of paper underneath to make the house not stick.
Next time, I would make the timing and the shaking more precise and have only one variable by cutting out parts that would make it not really a fair test. I would, for instance, focus on one thing like how long the shake was or how big the shake was. Doing them both was tricky to line up and it is hard to read on the project.
I found that using the rocks was hard because you couldn’t really get them all lined up properly to make a flat surface. You had to put the house on a craggy surface which wasn’t really fair to the rocks.
I learned that you need something that can absorb the movement in the earthquake waves. Like for instance, the mud in our experiment because it was soft and the house didn’t get much of the movement so it didn’t move much or topple over.
I thought like a scientist because we recorded all the results as precisely as we could, laid the results out in graphs and used the scientific process to do the experiment.
I really enjoyed getting the materials. Like getting the paper mache, going to get the sand and rocks, making the mud out of dirt and water and making the jelly.
I would tell the students next year to pick a science project that was really precise in their variables. They should only have one variable so it can be a far test. They should know how to use Excel and Word for the graphing and the writing.
