Experimental Plan

The research plan is a proposal of the experimental design for

your science fair project. Please use the experimental worksheet
to help you plan your experiment.
The research plan is a formal plan that you will write to explain
how you are going to test your hypothesis the answer to your
science fair question or problem. The plan must have the following
parts in the following order:
1. Science Fair Question or Problem Statement
This can be written as either a question or a simple statement of what
you intend to learn from your science fair project.
2. Rationale
This is a statement explaining how the results of your experiment will
benefit you and/or society as a whole.
3. Hypothesis
This is a prediction of the outcome of your experimental data, use the
following format for documenting your hypothesis.
If _________________, then ______________ because
___________.
This format is best way to identify your independent and dependent
variables.

4. Experimental SetThe experimental set is broken down into TWO parts, part 1 is a list
of the materials (including quantities in metric units) that you will
need for your experiment, and part 2 is a list of the procedures you
will follow in order to complete your experiment.
Both parts 1 and 2 are written in LIST format, no paragraphs are used
for this section.
5. Safety Concerns
Included in your Experimental Plan is a list of safety concerns that
will be noted and procedures to follow in the event of an accident.
ALL experimental plans will have a list of safety concerns, there is not
a single experiment that is completely safe.
6. References
Using the bibliography from your Research Paper, provide the same
set of bibliography entries in your Experimental Plan (ahem, copy and
paste from your research paper).

As with the Research Paper, this is typed in Times New

Roman, 12 point font, double spaced.

Experimental Plan
Notes/Frame

1. Science Fair Question or Problem Statement

____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
2. Rationale
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
3. Hypothesis (If, Then, Because)
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________

4. Experimental SetPart 1 Materials (and quantities in metric units)

_____________________
___________________
_____________________
___________________
_____________________
___________________
_____________________
___________________
_____________________
___________________
_____________________
___________________

_____________________

___________________

Part 2 Experiment Procedures (must be able to replicate the experiment)

1 - __________________________________________________
2 - __________________________________________________
3 - __________________________________________________
4 - __________________________________________________
5 - __________________________________________________
6 - __________________________________________________
7 - __________________________________________________
8 - __________________________________________________
9 - __________________________________________________
10 - _________________________________________________
11 - _________________________________________________
12 - _________________________________________________
13 - _________________________________________________
14 - _________________________________________________
15 - _________________________________________________
MOST EXPERIMENTS WILL REQUIRE MORE THAN 15 STEPS IN
ORDER TO BE ABLE TO SUCCESSFULLY REPLICATE THE EXACT
EXPERIMENT.
ATTENTION TO DETAIL IS CRITICALLY IMPORTANT!

5. Safety Concerns and Procedural Safeguards ____________________________________________________

____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
6. References
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________

____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________