Literature: Observation and Inference

Introduction

Ninth grade physics lesson: Observation and Inference from David Strasburger (NITARP alum)

Obviously, this can be expanded to any current event in the news.

Work

Learn about this week's big scientific news.

Read ONE of the sources below (live links from list) -- your choice:

• One of any of these articles from the general media (written by journalists for general public)
  • National Geographic
  • Scientific American
  • New Scientist
  • Reuters
  • Washington Post
  • CNN
  • New York Times
• The press release from the team of scientists (written by scientists for journalists)
• The journal article (written by scientists for scientists, the most technical, and also the most detailed)

WRITE out two lists:

1) what OBSERVATIONS did the scientists make?

2) what INFERENCES did the scientists make?

Note -- this is not an easy task, especially in the newspaper-type articles. The journalists will add a lot of information that is neither observation nor inference. So you will have to read carefully. Interestingly, the hardest thing to read (the scientific journal article) is the easiest one to use to separate out observation and inference. This is because scientific articles have separate sections for observation and inference, and scientists are very careful to be clear about which is which.

but just give it a try -- this is not high stakes!

it is OK if these are short lists!

3) Lastly, pick one item from each list and EXPLAIN why you put it in that list. Show that you understand what is meant by observation and inference.

Relevant topics from the rest of the wiki

(e.g., these are the "Lego bricks" to go investigate in order to build this "Lego kit.")

• Literature searching