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Red Frog Guide to the Scientific Method

Science is all about improving our lives. Without science we wouldn't have very much, compared to what we do have. No cars. No exotic foods. No television. No fancy clothes. No internet!

We sometimes forget that behind all the things we take for granted every day is a complex science that has been in development for years - and we even forget that even to this day, there are thousands of scientists out there performing experiments and researching so that our lives in the future can be made even easier.

But what it is these scientists do? Well, scientists use their facilities to try and make new discoveries. They might be trying to find a cure for an illness, or they might be trying to make a car work by using less fuel. They do so much! And they all rely on scientific method to ensure that all of their work goes to plan.

Scientific method is a way of investigating something that happens in science. Scientific method would have included how light can be captured by a device, when the scientists were discovering that we can display video on television screens.

So scientific method is all about learning about the ways things work in nature and science, and finding out new things which can help them with their work. New knowledge is acquired when the scientists perform their work.

Also, scientific method might involve a scientist looking back at something they learned a long time ago - and thinking whether or not they got it right! Scientific method often includes scientists trying to make their understanding of the world even better than before - so scientific method is a very complicated thing!

In order for the research of a scientist to be classed as 'scientific', scientific method must have been used to make sure that the information is absolutely correct. The information must have been based around making real observations, and measuring how reliable or truthful the information that had been got actually was.

When a scientist comes up with an idea, or a 'hypotheses', they must come up with some evidence to prove their point. Otherwise, they won't be taken seriously by the other scientists! This is yet again where scientific method comes in useful.

Although one procedure used by on scientist will vary when it comes to another scientist, there are specific features of scientific method which are used to make sure whether an understanding of science is totally right.

What happens is a scientist comes up with an idea, or a hypotheses, which explains why something scientific happens. Then after that, they will come up with ideas for experiments to prove that things happen because of the way that they have described them.

Then when they have performed the experiments, other scientists will look at their work and decide whether they agree or not. Scientific method simply makes sure that how we see the world is right, and this means that it is always changing as we learn more.

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