Teaching the Scientific Method in Core Curricula Through Practical Lab Assignments

Most core curricula at liberal arts schools require a science component to their undergraduate education for non-science majors. It is possible to meet these requirements with modified forms of normal science classes. However, for many students these classes can be a monotonous throwaway more than meaningful learning. At Lynn University, the core classes in “Dialogues of Scientific Literacy” incorporate opportunities for students to learn the scientific process via simple lab exercises without burdensome prerequisites. In one iteration, we implement a 3-part lab series meant to take students from observation to hypothesis formulation, to experimental design. The starting point is a simple animal observation experiment where data is collected and combined on an ongoing basis from each class. The final lab is a multistep experiment where they perform the scientific method start to finish using their phones as instruments for collecting quantitative sound data.