Plan a fair experiment

Grade 6 Science Worksheet - Challenge Me

Circle the best answer.

1. 1.

   Groups, warm: 1 spoon, stirred, cold: 3 spoons, not stirred. Esme's plan: warm circle water gets 1 spoon of sugar, cold circle water gets 3 spoons, and only the warm glass is stirred. Which fix makes it fair?

   • Keep the plan, since it already compares temperatures
   • Use 1 spoon in each and stir both the same way
   • Use warm water in both glasses
   • Use 3 spoons in each, but stir just the warm glass
2. 2.

   Groups, 1 soaked seed. Jun's plan: soak 1 seed overnight, plant it, and count the days until it sprouts. What is the best fix?

   • Soak 2 seeds instead of 1
   • Soak the 1 seed for longer
   • Soak 10 seeds, keep 10 dry, and plant all alike
   • Plant the soaked seed in a sunnier spot
3. 3.

   Groups, light: 1 throw outdoors, heavy: 1 throw indoors. Kira's plan: throw a light paper plane once outdoors and a heavy one once indoors, then compare distances. What is the best fix?

   • Throw the heavy plane harder than the light one
   • Throw both indoors, several times each
   • Add a third plane with a new wing shape
   • Throw both outdoors, once each
4. 4.

   Table, Trials, with columns Trial 1, Trial 2, Trial 3. Luz's friend says one trial is enough if you are careful. Which response is best?

   • Disagree: repeat trials catch odd results
   • Agree: more trials would change the variables
   • Disagree: each trial needs its own new hypothesis
   • Agree: careful work has no odd results

5. Read this first

   Bean plants (model data)

   Group	Average height
   plant food	15 cm
   plain water	11 cm

6. 5.

   Milo's cousin says, "My bean plants grew taller with plant food, so plant food helps plants everywhere." Which response is best?

   • Disagree: the test shows what happened to these bean plants
   • Disagree: plant food made these bean plants grow shorter, not taller
   • Agree: plant food is the same thing as water
   • Agree: one test shows it for plants everywhere
7. 6.

   "If ..., then ...". Investigation card: hypothesis, If ..., then .... Noah's friend says a hypothesis is just a guess, so any statement works. Which response is best?

   • Agree: any guess counts as a hypothesis
   • Agree: a hypothesis does not need testing
   • Disagree: a hypothesis must be shown to be true before testing
   • Disagree: it is a testable prediction about two variables
8. 7.

   Four plan cards beside a ball and a meter stick. Pia wants to know whether drop height changes bounce height. Which plan is best?

   • Drop 3 different balls from one height
   • Drop from 3 heights onto 3 different floors
   • Drop the ball once from each height
   • Drop the same ball from 3 heights, 3 times each, same floor
9. 8.

   Note: average of 3 trials. Sugar dissolved in 40 seconds on average in warm circle water and 95 seconds in cold. Which conclusion fits Zee's data?

   • Sugar dissolved faster in the warm water in this test
   • Sugar dissolved faster in the cold water in this one test
   • Warm water dissolves anything faster
   • Warm water is the nicer kind of water
10. 9.

    Note: average of 3 drops. Which conclusion fits Ari's bounce data?

    • Higher drops gave higher bounces for this ball
    • Higher drops gave lower bounces
    • Balls of any kind bounce higher from higher drops
    • The ball bounced back to its full drop height
11. 10.

    Note: 10 seeds per group. Bo's hypothesis: if seeds are soaked, they will sprout sooner. Ten seeds were in each group. What do the data say?

    • Seeds sprout because they wish to grow
    • The data do not support it; dry seeds sprouted first
    • They support it: soaked seeds sprouted 2 days sooner
    • The data show soaked seeds grow into bigger plants