Just for Teachers » | Field Journal
Objective
To emphasize the importance of accurate record-keeping, students will learn the proper
techniques for recording observations in a field journal. In addition, the journals
promote creativity and observation skills.
Why Keep a Field Journal?
Keeping a journal is an important part of fieldwork. A scientist uses it to provide
a permanent record of what is going on in the natural world, somewhat like a diary
of nature.
When you look back at pages from weeks gone by, you will know what day it was when
you saw particular things. If you keep a journal for many years, you will begin to
notice patterns. Eventually you will be able to predict when certain animals will
return and when particular plants will bloom.
Scientists call this phenology, the study of seasonal, weather-influenced
changes in living things.
Keeping a field journal is an excellent way to get students used to recording their
observations. Observing nature is an engaging activity for most students. Writing
down what they see encourages students to think about the world around them in a more
meaningful way, to ask questions about it, and to see patterns in nature. Although
this set of activities involves a study of the soil, field journals can be used for
other types of studies as well.
What Goes in a Field Journal?
A field journal is a diary, where you keep all the information you gather in the field.
As you observe nature and gather data through field tests and experiments, your field
journal gives you one place to store all the information you gather. Think about the
kinds of information you might keep in a field journal:
- What kinds of information will you need to record about the site where you are doing
your field work?
- What kinds of information will you need to record about the critters
you observe?
- What other information will help you to make sense of what you observe
or help you to find patterns?
- What other information might you want to have when
you look back at your notes after a week, a month, or a year?
You may want students to discuss their ideas in small groups and then share them with
the class, or you may choose to brainstorm as a class. In either case, write students'
responses on the board and accept all reasonable responses.
Watch
the video of a field scientist explaining what he puts in his field journal.
Compare the information the scientists included with the ideas you listed on the board.
What types of information did scientists include that students did not mention? How
might the type of information included in the field journal differ depending on the
particular study?
Creating Your Field Journal
A field journal is always a work in progress, since you will add information to it
for as long as you work in the field. However, there are some things you can do to
get your field journal started:
- Decide what you will use for your field journal. A binder or notebook to which
you can add pages will probably work best.
Data recording worksheets are included for each activity in this set. Using a
binder will allow students to include these printed worksheets in their journal.
There are a number of other options, however, that you may find more suited to
your students. You may elect to staple the worksheets and blank pages together
to create a journal. You may also have students use a notebook and simply hand
copy the worksheets into the notebook or design their own way to record their
data. Students can also use the worksheets and then just record a synopsis of
their data in their journals.
- Create a cover for your journal. Be sure to include your name, grade, school,
and a title for your field study. You can use the Journal
Cover worksheet
or create your own.
- Define your research question. What is it you hope to learn from your field work?
The activities on the Underground Adventure Web site will help you answer
the question: What is the relationship between the soil's physical properties,
environmental and human factors, and soil biodiversity? You may have a different
question you want to answer, or your teacher may give you a different research
question. You may choose to do only some of the activities provided. What question
do you hope to answer through your research? When you decide on your research
question, write it down in your field journal. What are some other questions you
have about the soil and the creatures that live there? Write down two or three
additional research questions. You may want to design a study to investigate those
research questions later. The questions you ask here will guide your observations.
Of course, you can always change your questions or pose new ones as you learn
more through your research.
The activities on this site are designed to help students
study the research question mentioned here. If you choose to focus on only one
or more of the activities on the Web site, you will need to adjust the research
question to match the activities you select. You may also work with students to
determine a research question about soil that interests them, and then select
activities from the Web site to help answer this question. Have students explore
the Underground Adventure Field
Guide
and Meet the Creepy Critters to stimulate
their thinking.
- Generate a hypothesis, or an educated guess, to answer your research question.
Think about the research question. You may want to find out more about soil life
before you formulate a hypothesis. Meet the
Creepy Critters, the Underground
Adventure Field Guide ,
and the Resources section of this Web site
are good places to start. Then try to answer the research question. Don't worry—your
hypothesis might not be right, but make the best guess you can based on what you
know about soil life. As you do the activities on this Web site, you will begin
to find out if your hypothesis is correct, and you can always change your hypothesis
as you learn more.
If necessary, review the scientific method with your students.
Students can begin to see the value of asking a guiding question and then designing
a study or experiment to answer it.
- Several of the Underground Adventure activities include printable worksheets
for collecting your data. Before you get started on an activity, print out the
data sheets you will use and add them to your field journal so you'll be ready
to collect data when you're working at your field site.
Tips for Using Your Field Journal
You should bring your field journal each time you go into the field. Below are a few
tips to help you use your field journal.
- For each soil activity that you do, there will be a worksheet that you can use
to record your data. To make it easier to see how all the data fits together,
you should also record the results from each of the activities together in one
place. You can use the Field Study worksheet
for this or create your own.
You can easily adapt this to your students' particular
interest levels and abilities. For more advanced students, you may ask them to
determine what kinds of data they will look for in the field and have them create
their own soil study page. For others, you may ask them to create a soil study
page after they return from the first day of field work. They will then need to
determine which data should be included in the synopsis of that day's field work.
- Write everything down. Be sure to include lots of blank pages in your journal,
so that you can write or draw what you see, hear, smell, feel, even taste!
- Make a note if there is something new at your site, such as a new plant or a burrow
under a tree that wasn't there the last time you observed.
- Always record the date and time when you make an observation.
Students should record this on every page of their journal
so that they can re-order their pages if necessary.
- Use as much detail as possible. Remember, you want to be able to get good information
from your journal a week from now or a month from now.
- Question what you see. As you observe, you may have questions about what you see.
Be sure to write your questions down. Who knows, they may become the guiding questions
for another field study!
As a follow-up to the Underground Adventure activities
or as the field work progresses, you may ask each student or group of students
to design an experiment or study around one of their questions. They can record
information related to their question, in addition to the other information they
are recording.
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