Name_______________________________

Period______

Nature of Science Unit 

Review for Exam 

Understanding and correctly answering these questions will be of great help on the exam. Go through the questions twice, once without your notes (to see what you remember) and once with your notes (to make sure you have the correct answers). See your instructor before the exam if you have any questions.

Scientific Method:

1. What do we call the study of living things?

2. What is the definition of science? What is a scientist?

3. List and explain the steps of the scientific method.

4. Why is it so important to make good observations in science?

5. What is a hypothesis? Why must it be testable?

6. Explain how to write a formalized hypothesis.

7. What is a controlled experiment?

8. What is a variable?

9. What is an independent variable?

10. What is a dependent variable?

11. How is the independent variable related to the dependent variable?

12. What is the difference between a control group and an experimental group?

13. Why is it necessary to have a control group in a controlled experiment?

14. Which is more helpful, proving a hypothesis wrong or supporting a hypothesis? Why?

15. Identify the independent and dependent variable in the following question. Also write two formalized hypotheses for the question. “How does the weight of the rocket affect its flight time?”

16. What is bias? Why is it to so important for scientists to be unbiased?

17. What is a scientific model?

18. What are the three types of models? Give an example of each type.

19. Why are models so beneficial?

20. What is a scientific theory? What is a scientific law?

21. Explain the difference between scientific theories and laws.

22. Describe how you would conduct an experiment to answer the following question: “How does the amount of study time affect how well the student does on the test?”

1. What is the independent variable?

2. What is the dependent variable?

3. What is the only factor that changes?

4. Describe the factors that must remain constant.

5. Write a formalized hypothesis.

6. Describe an experiment you could conduct to answer the question stated above. 

Measurement:

23. What is the base unit used to measure length? What piece of equipment is used to measure length?

24. What is the base unit used to measure liquid volume? What piece of equipment is used to measure liquid volume?

25. What is the base unit used to measure solid volume? What piece of equipment is used to measure solid volume?

26. What is the base unit used to measure mass? What piece of equipment is used to measure mass?

27. What is the base unit used to measure temperature? What piece of equipment is used to measure temperature?

28. What is the SI system of measurements? What are the advantages of using the SI system of measurements?

29. Write out the SI prefixes chart.

30. Explain the process used to convert from one SI unit to another.

31. Convert 9.35 m into centimeters.

32. Convert 193.69 kL into mL.

33. How many kilometers (km) are there in 3,529 meters (m)?

34. Convert 329.5 hectograms (hg) into milligrams (mg).

35. How many centimeters are in a meter? How many millimeters are in a centimeter?

36. How many meters are in a kilometer? How many milliliters are in a liter?

37. Calculate mean, median, mode, and range for the following data set:

0, 1, 1, 1, 2, 3, 6, 6, 7, 7, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10, 10, 10, 11, 15, 21

1. Mean:

2. Median:

3. Mode:

4. Range:

Graphing:

38. Create a graph on graphing paper based on the following data:

1. Be sure to include a title, x-axis label and units, and y-axis label and unites. Also explain on the back which graph you chose to make and why (Ex. bar graph, line graph, or pie chart).

39. Draw a line of best fit on a graph, for the scenario provided.

1. You bring a cold pop outside on a hot day during the summer. You forget about the pop, and eventually over the next hour the pop gets warmer and warmer.

2. It is a cold winter day, and you want to drink hot chocolate while you are out sledding with friends. You keep the hot chocolate in your thermos and it remains at a constant temperature while you are sledding for an hour, then you pour it into your glass and it then begins to cool down over the next several minutes.