Scientific Log Book

Scientific Log Book

Your name here!

Contents

1. Your log book should start with a contents page,
just like a text book does!

2.Your contents might be broken up in several ways:
into phases of your experiment (creating a question,
planning your investigation, observations, etc.), by
time (day 1, day 2, etc.), or by any way that you
think is a logical way to navigate your investigation.

3. Yes, this means you have to number the pages in
your log book! This might seem time consuming, but
will save you a lot of time in the long run!

Before the investigation

Everything you do prior to the investigation must be
recorded in your log book! What would you like to
investigate? How? Write it all down!
You won’t be answering every question you write in your
log book, and undoubtedly, things will get a little messy –
what’s important is that all of your thought processes
and ideas are recorded, whether you use them or not.
Keeping a record of all of your ideas is a really good
habit to get into. It prepares you for working as a
scientist, where you take handwritten notes for your
investigations, and also allows you to share your way of
thinking with other people.
When helping you formulate your investigations, your
teacher will be looking at your log book – put down as
much information as possible, so that they can help you
as best they can!

During the investigation

Your log book is where all of the data that you collect
should be going. Observations, measurements, further
ideas – they should all go in here!
What if something goes wrong? WRITE IT IN YOUR
LOG BOOK. If you change any aspect of your
investigation, if anything unexpected happens, or if you
get results that don’t really answer your question in the
way that you’d hoped, write it down anyway! Very few
scientific investigations go exactly the way that the
scientist had hoped. Record any surprises you come
across or mistakes that you make. So many scientific
discoveries are actually happy accidents, so don’t be
afraid to be ‘wrong’ – there are no wrong answers with
investigations!

How to use your log book

Your log book is a history of your investigation, both for
your own benefit and to share with others. Please ensure
that your handwriting is legible and that your data is
recorded clearly (for example, using units such as cm or
mg when recording measurements: just because you
know what you mean, doesn’t mean that others will!)
There are no set rules when it comes to creating a log
book. You may choose to add photographs, drawings,
diagrams, tables, measurements, observational notes,
ideas, or snippets of information you’ve picked
up along the way. Try to correctly label
everything that you put in your log book. The
more that you pack into your log book, the
more information you’ll have to create your
poster from!

Fig. 1: a diagram of a young scientist conducting an investigation.

Tricks to creating a great log book

When creating a log book, the trick is to get the
information down as soon as possible after making an
observation or recording, so that you don’t forget it.
Make sure you put a date and time with your recordings,
so you know when each one was made!

Try using abbreviations to save time on reading and
writing. If you do this, make sure you provide a page that
tells us what each abbreviation means, so that others
can understand.

If you’re not sure whether or not your log book is
effective, test it out! Ask a family member or friend if
they understand what you’re doing, just from reading
your log book. Ideally, ask someone who doesn’t know
about your investigation. They should be able to read
your log book and tell you exactly what your
investigation is, how you are undertaking it, and what
your results are so far.

References:
All images from creative commons.