Water With Other Plants example essay topic

Growth of bean plants Control variables: Distilled water, vinegar, sugar water Experimental variables: water Title: Chemical and water affect ance on bean plants Purpose: Do different chemicals such as distilled water, sugar and vinegar affect the growth of bean plants. Materials and apparatus: Materials Water Distilled water Sugar Vinegar Seeds (bean, color white) Natural sunlight Regular oxygen Regular CO 2 Space Competition (other plants) Nutrients Temperature 12 plastic cups Soil Experimental variable; vinegar & water Apparatus 100 ml beaker Measuring spoon Cups 10 ml graduated cylinder Soil Ruler Seeds Diagram Control Variable; water experimental variable; distilled water experimental variable, sugar water, . nm Procedure: 1. Gather all materials 2. Put on safety goggles 3. Setup control experiment by, getting 60 ml of soil and putting it in the bottom on the cup 4. Then place 4 seeds on top, being the same distance apart 5.

Afterwards place 40 ml of coil on top of seeds 6. When that's done, measure 20 ml of water and water the plant 7. Do the same steps in 2 other cups 8. Get a piece of paper, and label, control experiment, water. 9. Do these same steps for Distilled, vinegar, sugar water, having 3 cups for each substance.

10. Water plants every 3 days, using the same amount of water (20 ml) 11. Take data everyday, by measuring the height, width, color of leaves, # of leaves, and divide it by 12 each, to get average 12. Do all this for 15 days; observe the different changes a plant will go through. Hypothesis: I predict that the distilled water, will make a plant go faster because, its more pure and will probably make get its nutrients faster. After the distilled water, I say that vinegar & water will make the plant go faster also.

However, it wont make it grow as fast as distilled, because probably the chemicals that the vinegar contains, are strong and it will take the plant longer to retain its energy because the cause of vinegar. Water, will make the plant grow at a regular speed, and maybe even slower, because its competing with 2 other chemicals to see which one will make it grow, but the thing about water is that sometimes it doesn't affect much on the plant. I say that sugar, will make a plant grow last because, the chemicals in sugar are very sweet, which will affect the plant and make its nutrient weaker, not full energized, so probably sugar will make the plant as a result to be rotten. Data Tables: Water Day Height of plant Width of plant color of plant # of leaves other obs 1 0 0 0 0 no 2 19.46 cm 2.86 cm grass green 10 a plants root is sticking out 3 22 cm 3 cm grass green 10 " 4 25 cm 3.85 cm grass green 10 plant is starting to grow fast 5 28 cm 4.6 cm grass green 10 " 6 32.72 cm 5.27 cm grass green 10 new leaves coming out 7 33.1 5.4 cm grass green 15 " 8 36.18 6 cm grass green 18 " 9 38.93 7.9 cm grass green 25 " 10 40.1 10 cm grass green 27 " Distilled water Day Height of plant Width of plant color of plant # of leaves other obs 1 0 0 0 0 no 2 7.2 1.3 light green 1.5 plant is getting higher 3 9 3.12 light green 2 " 4 14.8 4.8 light green 3 " 5 19 5.6 grass green 3.3 " 6 25.4 9.1 grass green 42 new leaves, color changing 7 27.1 12.2 grass green 5.3 " 8 29.5 15.3 grass green 6 " 9 31 21 grass green 8 " 10 35.2 23 grass green 10 " Vinegar & water Day Height of plant Width of plant color of plant # of leaves other obs 1 0 0 0 0 no 2 8.625 1.25 dark green 1.5 no 3 10.2 3.7 dark green 3.4 plant is getting higher 4 11.8 4.9 dark green 4.7 " 5 12.8 5.2 dark green 6.15 " 6 13.3 6.5 dark green 7.2 theres a dead plant 7 46.2 7.8 dark green 9.8 " 8 48.9 10.4 dark green 10 flowers 9 49.9 11.8 dark green 12.1 " 10 50.5 12.3 dark green 13.7 Sugar water Day Height of plant Width of plant color of plant # of leaves other obs 1 0 0 0 0 no 2 3 1.75 light green 1.3 plant growing, color changing 3 4.5 1.8 light / dark green 1.5 " 4 5.7 1.85 light / dark green 2 plant is slower, not growing 5 6 2.3 light / dark green 2 rotten, mose growing 6 6.2 2.7 dark green 2 mose is bigger, plant drowning with water not evaporating 7 6.2 2.85 brown / dark green 2 faom being produced, next to mose 8 6.6 2.9 brown / dark green 2 " very bad smell being made 9 6.8 2.9 brown / dark green 2 bad smell, very rotten 10 6.8 3 brown / dark green 2 dead plants Conclusion questions: 1. Why did your group select to study the experimental variable in your lab activity? Well, my group and I decided to test water because, usually what people use to make plants grow is water.

We thought that if water combined with other chemicals it would make a plant grow slower, faster, or even make the plant die. That's why we decided to see if water with other plants could affect the growth of bean plants. 2. What areas did your group find the most difficult in designed this lab activity? I thought that the whole designing of the experiment was very hard because, my group and I had mayor problems the first 2 weeks, so we had to start our experiment over about 3 times. The first time we designed our experiment, we thought we would use the chemicals; backing soda, aspirin and salt, but the control would stay the same as water.

The first week we thought it would work ok. But it didn't, our plants had all very bad smell, they were drowning because the water wasn't evaporating, and they wouldn't grow a single root. So we threw those away, and we started thinking what was wrong in our designing of our experiment. So we tried it again, and the same thing happened, so we had to re-do our experiment over.

That's when we decided he would change everything, the seeds, the experimental chemicals and the waive we measured. First we were measuring in grams, which was very hard because to accomplish that we had to do about 4 steps. So we then decided to measure in ml. After the first week or 2 of changing our experiment, our plants started to grow. 3. In what ways is a controlled experiment different from a non-controlled experiment?

Well, in a control experiment is when you have a certain variable such as water, and your controlling it. For ex, taking its proper temperature, making sure its being boiled or going through its freezing point or even condensing point, what I mean is that there is a human activity going on to control the variable. In a non-controlled experiment, its almost the same, your using the same variable but your not controlling it, instead your just leaving it freely, so there is no human response in the way. That's the difference between a controlled experiment and a non-controlled one. 4. Discuss the difficulties your group had in the careful and accurate collection of data.

How do you think this affected the results of your lab? The difficulties my group had were sometimes big, that we had to start over and start collecting data all over again. For example, in the collecting of my data, I sometimes forgot were I had placed my results and probably placed them somewhere else. That's why I had to re-it over. I thought it was very frustrating to take data about 3 times every time I messed up because I had to see if it was very accurate. Other case is that sometimes I would forget a number and wouldn't include it, for that reason I would also have to measure everything of my plants again.

I knew that this would affect the results of my experiment, which's why for every mistake I did I had to take my data over. This would affect the results of our lab, because imagine that if we collected our whole data wrong, we would probably say that sugar water made a plant grow faster. For that reason it was very important to get our data exact or else it could wreck our entire experiment and not have the right results, instead we would have false results. 5. What were the most interesting parts of this lab activity? What did you find the least interesting?

I thought it was very interesting to see the plants different stages, and also how I got to know more about plants, and not just think of them as a leave, stem and roots. I liked seeing how a plant developed through its different stages of growth by germination, and how an embryo became a young plant in just a few weeks. I also found interesting the way that plants use sunlight, water and the air around it to become a healthy plant. I really didn't like the fact that as soon as the plant is rotten or dead, it doesn't have its potential anymore, it's just a plant with a really bad smell, and a very nasty appearance that you really don't want to see. I really disliked the fact that I had to take data, it was the thing I hated the most, apart from it being very boring. however, the overall experiment was fun seeing how plants grow. 6.

Was your hypothesis supported or rejected for each group? Discuss this in detail and try to explain the differences between what you thought would happen and what actually happened? In the outcome of this experiment, it turned out that my hypothesis was rejected. I though that distilled water would of make a plant go faster, but it didn't. It turned out that Vinegar water made a plant grow faster by a growing height of 50.5 cm and a width of 12.3 cm. But only had an average of 13.7 leaves.

Water came next with having an average height of 40.1 cm and a width of 10 cm. This plant contained a really great amount of leaves, 27 leaves, which was the highest of our results. After water came distilled with a height of 35.2 cm and a width of 23 cm. Which is very high, it had an average of 10 cm.

All of these plants had success, but sugar didn't. Sugar had many problems when it came to grow. The first week it was doing fine but the next, I started realizing that the planted was starting to die, it also started producing a bad smell. In overall, I really can't say what plant had the best growing. I thought that the whole results would of turned out differently. The reason I say this because, you really can't tell which plant grew the most because, all the plants, except sugar, had different heights and widths and # of leaves.

I mean vinegar may of have been the tallest, but distilled water had the most width in leaves and water had the most leaves, so I'm puzzled and I really don't know which plant had most accomplishment. There were a lot of differences of the way I thought the experiment would turn out to be, and what actually did happen. What I mean is that each plant had its different results, but like they were competing one can clearly see the differences of how each chemical reacted to the plant. What actually happened is hard to say, as I said before because of the results he had varied, that's why this whole lab is very awkward. 7. Discuss the experimental errors or anomalies in this lab activity?

In this lab, the only experimental errors occurred in the sugar water. I'd say that the other chemicals reacted extremely well in the plants. Sugar was the only one with difficulties. The plants that contained sugar water, every day they would become a darker color and the plant would not simply grow. It would stay the same.

I really didn't like the bad smell that the plant was producing because, besides it smelling extremely bad, I think it may affected the way the plant obtained its nutrients and water, because the bad smell concentrated in a certain area, which probably didn't let and oxygen get into the plant. Another anomaly or mistake that the plant was producing was an extremely amount of moss. I don't know want was the cause of this experimental error, all I know is that it happened in a sudden way. 8. Design a color-coded graph for each area you studied in your data table?

(See next pages) 9. Based on your graphs, explain the major differences and similarities of the plant growth between the groups? Well, in the graph, one can say that there are major differences and similarities. One of the major differences is that in the first week, all the different heights were extremely varied.

For example, water started with an average height of 19.46 cm while distilled started with 7.2 cm, though distilled was very close with vinegar which had an average of 8.625 cm. Sugar was the least with 3 cm. I think that a major similarity is that in the area of width, they all pretty much started at the same paste. Water started at 2.85 cm, distilled started at 1.3 cm, vinegar started at 1.5 and sugar started at 1.75, you can say that sugar was growing fast.

I say that the major differences happened in other observations. During the days, sugar plant started dying, the water started to pop out roots but getting bigger, vinegar started flowering and distilled was like water, which started growing at a high paste. Water started having a lot of leaves, with an average of 10 cm, while the other three, were similar. Distilled and vinegar had an average # of leaves of 1.5 cm, while sugar had 1.3. I think those are the major similarities and differences the different groups shared. 10.

If you had to re-design this lab activity what changes would you make and why? If I had the chance to re-do this experiment I would change it by using different chemicals and different seed, such as sunflowers. I would do these changes because, I'm tired of bean plants, and because every single experiment I have done since kinder, have always been bean plants. I would like to see another plants reaction using different chemicals and different seeds, I would like to see the other changes, and I could then compare them to the bean plants, to see the differences. The other chemicals I would use would be: dough, coffee and lemon. Those would be the only changes that I would change to do this lab activity.