Research stage
Choosing your topic
You need to choose a relevant topic in chemistry to investigate.
You must agree your topic with your teacher or lecturer.
Deciding your aim
Once you have chosen your topic you need to decide on the aim of your investigation. Remember that you need to:
- do an experiment
- find data/information to compare with your experimental results
Your teacher or lecturer will provide advice on the suitability of your aim.
Experimental research
When choosing your experiment, remember it must allow a number of measurements to be taken.
When carrying out your experiment, you must work either on your own or as part of a small group. If you are working as part of a small group, you must take an active part.
Make sure you use a sufficient number of values over a wide enough range to meet the aim of your investigation.
You must repeat your experiment, if possible.
You will use your raw experimental data during the report stage.
Internet/literature research
You need to find data/information from the internet, books and/or journals that you can compare to your experimental data.
This could be:
- a table
- a graph
- information from diagrams
- information from text
This data/information does not need to exactly match your experiment but could illustrate the trend or pattern expected in your experimental data.
It is important that you record where you get your data/information from in enough detail that another person could find it. This is known as a reference.
In your report you will need to describe the chemistry relevant to your aim. You can gather extracts from the internet, books and/or journals to help you write your description of the underlying chemistry.
During the report stage you will need to show your understanding by writing this description using your own words.