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Chemistry/biology/Physics Lab Books

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  • 14-04-2007 11:56am
    #1
    Your Man
    Closed Accounts Posts: 139 ✭✭


    Seriously has an inspector ever actually come to your school to check if they are filled in?
    personally i stopped writing uo experiments around half way through 5th year, complete waste of time imo


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    #2
    dan719
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,597 ✭✭✭dan719


    Same as myself so, I stopped after the second experiment. I can't imagine actually being stopped from doing the exam. The experiments are not exactly difficult, although that didn't stop me making a mess of them. Damn labs!:D


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    #3
    JC 2K3
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,794 ✭✭✭JC 2K3


    I had none written out, but wrote most of them out as part of studying for my mocks.

    When revising the experiments you might as well just write em out in your lab book, it helps you to learn them anyway.


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    #4
    fuinneamh
    Registered Users Posts: 137 ✭✭fuinneamh


    Stopped writing the experiments cause i've never done a physics or chemistry experiment thats actually worked correctly, whats the point in recording one failure after another?


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    #5
    dan719
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,597 ✭✭✭dan719


    JC 2K3 wrote:
    When revising the experiments you might as well just write em out in your lab book, it helps you to learn them anyway.

    But the inspectors don't care if you have written them out, they want to see evidence you have actually performed them . A lab book written without results is no more useful then no lab book at all in that case.


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    #6
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 8,647 ✭ [Deleted User]


    fuinneamh wrote:
    Stopped writing the experiments cause i've never done a physics or chemistry experiment thats actually worked correctly, whats the point in recording one failure after another?
    God.I have great hope for the future science students in third levl.If you are getting a wrong result.It i because your set-up,procedure etc was incorrect.Noting where you went wrong in an experiment is crucial in experimentation.ie so you wont make the same mistake again.


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    #7
    ZorbaTehZ
    Registered Users Posts: 2,149 ✭✭✭ZorbaTehZ


    fuinneamh wrote:
    Stopped writing the experiments cause i've never done a physics or chemistry experiment thats actually worked correctly, whats the point in recording one failure after another?

    We've done a total of one experiment in the two years I've spent studying LC physics. The whole class has spent the last year hoping that the examiner dude shows up so he can find out how incompetent our teacher is.


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    #8
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 8,647 ✭ [Deleted User]


    ZorbaTehZ wrote:
    We've done a total of one experiment in the two years I've spent studying LC physics. The whole class has spent the last year hoping that the examiner dude shows up so he can find out how incompetent our teacher is.
    Are you serious man?Where you go to school?Mary's?


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    #9
    unnameduser
    Registered Users Posts: 1,081 ✭✭✭unnameduser


    As mentioned earlier the experiments are not working properly because the set up or procedure is incorrect. Believe it or not but something i have noticed in a lot of schools is that some chemicals are out of date / incorrectly labelled etc...

    Time to chuck them out and order a new batch


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    #10
    cookiemonst3r
    Registered Users Posts: 238 ✭✭cookiemonst3r


    We're actually gettin an chemistry inspector next week. I was lucky though, had most of my experiments written up. some people weren't so lucky.


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    #11
    fuinneamh
    Registered Users Posts: 137 ✭✭fuinneamh


    Deleted User wrote:
    God.I have great hope for the future science students in third levl.If you are getting a wrong result.It i because your set-up,procedure etc was incorrect.Noting where you went wrong in an experiment is crucial in experimentation.ie so you wont make the same mistake again.


    i should clarify, 50% of the time i never even get results, my teacher doesn't have a clue whats going on and tells you to write it out the experiment and use results that have appeared in past papers.


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    #12
    Delphi91
    Registered Users Posts: 1,501 ✭✭✭Delphi91


    Your Man wrote:
    Seriously has an inspector ever actually come to your school to check if they are filled in?
    personally i stopped writing uo experiments around half way through 5th year, complete waste of time imo

    As a physics teacher, I can confirm that inspectors DO call and look for the experiment lab books. I have had the privilege of having one visit my school and looking for lab books. We got 4 days notice of his visit.

    He went through the copies with a fine tooth comb and commented on the results and methods.

    As for experiments not working out, they should. The odd expt will go wrong but not all of them!! As long as you can give a reasonable explanation for the failure you should be fine.

    Mike


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    #13
    dan719
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,597 ✭✭✭dan719


    Thanks for the info. I am just wondering so how many of your sudents were mysteriously ill that day?:D i.e what some of us(almost everyone on the thread in fact) would have to resort to if an inspector ever did come to the school!:rolleyes:


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    #14
    JC 2K3
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,794 ✭✭✭JC 2K3


    Delphi91 wrote:
    As a physics teacher, I can confirm that inspectors DO call and look for the experiment lab books. I have had the privilege of having one visit my school and looking for lab books. We got 4 days notice of his visit.

    He went through the copies with a fine tooth comb and commented on the results and methods.

    As for experiments not working out, they should. The odd expt will go wrong but not all of them!! As long as you can give a reasonable explanation for the failure you should be fine.

    Mike
    Don't most students just copy out of the book? Why would a student bother recording a failure?

    When I'm doing a physics experiment where you have to do it 5/6 times I usually do it twice and make up the rest of the results and if I ever actually get around to writing it out copy the method from the book(Although significantly shortened).

    As a matter of interest, I'm sure there were at least one or two copies which weren't perfect, what happened to those students?


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    #15
    Delphi91
    Registered Users Posts: 1,501 ✭✭✭Delphi91


    To dan719 - to the best of my knowledge only one student was absent on the day (out of around 20) - he was a regular absentee anyway, so nothing unusual there!

    To JC_2K3 - there's nothing wrong with recording a failure. You don't get marks for getting the experiment "right". The inspector is interested in seeing that you've actually done the experiment. Think about it - when scientists do experiments for the first time, they don't know the "right" answer. All their lab books do is record what they did, what methods they used, readings they took, etc. That's all you're doing also.

    Look at the titles of the experiments - none of them tell you the answer you're supposd to find - measurement of g, measurement of the speed of sound in air, etc. Ok, we all know what you SHOULD get for the answer, but we don't always get that answer for one reason or another.

    As long as you can give a reasonable explanation in your lab book as to why the experiment gave the answer that you got then the answer (right or wrong) is perfectly acceptable.

    As for copying the instructions from the book, well, yeah, I guess people do that. But a lab report should always be an account of what you did (past tense) and its always best to phrase it like "The length was measured" rather than "I measured the length"

    When you say "one or two copies that weren't perfect" what do you mean? Wrong answers? Badly explained? Poor method?, etc. Nothing happened to them. There was a comment on the method that was used in the one of the experiments but overall we got on fine.

    To all LC physics students - the following is a quote from the syllabus:
    Practical work
    Students must follow a course of practical work. The experiments listed at the end of each section of the syllabus must be carried out by the students and an adequate record of such work must be retained for the period of the course.


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    #16
    Selphie
    Closed Accounts Posts: 428 ✭✭Selphie


    ZorbaTehZ wrote:
    We've done a total of one experiment in the two years I've spent studying LC physics. The whole class has spent the last year hoping that the examiner dude shows up so he can find out how incompetent our teacher is.

    Same with us, except it's biology!! the only experiments we've done are the food ones that you do in JC Science anyway *cries* our Biology mocks results were soooo bad.


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