Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

How do you write a scientific proposal? What is the order? Do we have to do a table of contents?

Hi Victoria,

There are several ways to write a proposal for a science project but they all start with a statement of what you think will happen if you do something. This is called your hypothesis. I am assuming that you have chosen a subject that interests you and have thought up a question to ask that is testable by scientific experiments.

If you haven't read the Scibuddies science fair project guide, you should because it outlines all the steps that you need to work out for a proposal. What you include in the proposal is really just what you plan to do in the project. The order in which you put things in the proposal may vary according to how your teacher wants you to set it up, but all the parts will need to be there.

You should try to think of a good title for your project--something that will catch people's attention and make them stop and ask you what you about what you found out.

I like to include a couple of paragraphs of background in which I explain why I chose this subject, why it is important and how my question/hypothesis relates to what is already known about it. You can make this part as long as you want but make sure you cite references to support your statements. You will have to do some careful online searches, reading and understanding of the science so you can explain it clearly to someone who probably doesn't know that much about it.

Then I make an official statement of the hypothesis.

The next part describes how you will test your hypothesis. You need to make it clear how the experiment will give you the information you need to answer the question. You can label this section Methods. Explain in detail exactly how you will do the experiments and also include your statistical methods--means of three or more readings, calculation of standard deviation, determination of p-values, chi-squared test, etc.

If you think there is a possibility that an experiment won't work out the way you planned then it is a good idea to include an alternative method as a back-up. Unforeseen problems occur pretty often in science and showing that you recognize this and are prepared for it is the mark of a good scientist.

At the end of your proposal you can if you want make some more statements about the importance of your planned results to the field of study. Then you can speculate on what your results might mean and propose further experiments to broaden and enhance your work. That is the way scientists try to convince granting agencies that their project is worth funding.

If you have more specific questions, let us know.

Good luck!

Sybee