Writing a Conclusion
A conclusion is short, concise, and conveys the entirety of the experiment.
Scientists have to read many science papers, but more papers are published than
anyone can actually read. To determine if a paper is worth reading, scientists will
sometimes just read the conclusion. If the conclusion is poorly written, or doesn’t
say anything worthwhile, then people will not read the rest of the paper.
The state of Washington, when assessing science, uses the ability to write a
conclusion as evidence of science ability. This is a good choice because a conclusion
is a summary of an entire experiment, but because it’s a summary a test scorer is
able to evaluate your scientific thinking without reading an entire lab.
If the goal of writing a conclusion is to provide a summary of an experiment,
then what goes in a conclusion is easy to remember.
An experiment has a purpose and tests something. That needs to be in the
conclusion. You have measured or observed things; that also needs to be in the
conclusion. You learned things from the experiment, that goes in the conclusion too.
If you have done a pre-lab properly, the conclusion is easy to write, since you have a
purpose and hypothesis or question.
Standard Based Scoring:
1. Purpose is clear.
2. Hypothesis is clear, and either supported or not supported by data.
3. Data is summarized.
4. Implications or connections are stated.
5. Errors, improvements, and next questions are stated.
Each of the five categories are assigned a score of 1 to 4, 1 indicates a beginner, 3 is
at standard. The Mode is calculated, and given as an assigned score. When entering
this score in the gradebook, the following percentages will be used: 1 = 59%, 2 =
69%, 3 = 90%, 4 = 100%
Here is an example of a conclusion that is worth a score of 1:
My hypothesis was proved correct, a car on a smooth surface goes faster than on
carpet.
This is a beginning level, while it makes reference to a hypothesis, a reader cannot
determine the hypothesis or the purpose of this experiment. Several parts are
missing.
Here is an example of a conclusion worth 2 points:
My hypothesis was supported by this experiment. Cars were run on different
surfaces, on the floor it went 12, on the carpet it went 10, and on a track it went 11,
so the floor was the best.
This is a two, reaching standard, because there are several things that are included,
but there are a few mistakes. While it talks about the hypothesis, I still don’t get a
good understanding of why this experiment was done. The conclusion shows data,
but it just repeats the data, its not a summary. There is an attempt to talk about the
implications of the results, but “the best” is really vague.
Here is a 3 point answer:
This experiment explored the relationship between the surface a toy car travels on
and the speed that car moves. We compared three different surfaces, and found that
the smoother the surface, the faster the car moved. This provided evidence that
supported our hypothesis that cars go faster on smooth surfaces. On the roughest
surface, carpet, the car’s speed was 10 cm/second, the smoothest surface, the class
floor, the car’s speed was 12 cm/ second. This means that for the same amount of
energy, a smoother surface allows a car to move faster. Our biggest source of error
was measuring time with a stopwatch. Having more than one person timing would
increase our accuracy.
This is a standard answer; It clearly explains the experiment.
For a four-point answer, some connections and deep thinking need to occur.
Adding the following sentence would make the 3-point answer a 4-point answer:
I wonder if making roads smoother would allow cars to move faster, or let them
save gas?
Scoring Rubric:
Category
1. Purpose.
2. Hypothesis. Unclear
3. Data.
4. Implications/connections.
5. Errors, improvements,
and next questions.
1
No Purpose
Unclear
No Data
Missing
Missing
Points
2
Vague
Vague
Not summarized
Unclear
Trivial
3
Clear
Clear
Summarized
Present
Clear
Hints:
Almost any search of “science conclusion writing” will find more information
about writing conclusions.
Don’t forget that the reason for writing a conclusion is to communicate about
your experiment. Keep in mind that your audience may not know what you were
working on.
A conclusion stands alone, anybody (The principle, the teacher, your parents)
should be able to read the conclusion by itself, and understand your experiment.
A conclusion should be short, one or two paragraphs.
A conclusion should be thorough, and contain all the points.