| Explore | If seeds have the right amount and kind of materials to help it grow and develop, then it will grow into a healthy plant. |
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| Research Question | How does the amount of light the seed absorbs affect the rate of germination? |
| Predictions | If you give a seed more light, then the rate of germination will increase because light is a main source of how the seed will begin to grow and develop. |
| Experimental Design | 1. Collect 10 radish seeds per person. 2.Pick a plant rack to use. 3. Place the damp paper towel in the petri dish 4. There will be 6 petri dishes. 5. The temperature in the room and the plant type will be the same. As well as the seed will be watered the same amount as each other. 6. Two of them will be for the 5 seeds that get light for 24 hours, 2 of them will be for the 5 seeds that get 7 hours of light, and the other two of them will be for the 5 seeds that get one hour of light. 7. Collect the data after a couple of days from all 3 of the petri dishes since half of them will just be duplicates in case something goes wrong. 8. Record the length of growth from the root to the sprout in millimeters and the rate of increase from one day to another. We will also pay a little bit of attention to the color of the seeds to see how or if they change. 9. We will just do two trials because we will have an extra petri dish for each variable being changed just in case something happens and our data gets thrown off. |
| Conclusion | If you give a seed light and darkness then the rate of germination will increase because it is essential for a small seed to spend some time in the shade to protect the small root. In this experiment we put 10 seeds under light for 24 hours, 7 hours, and 1 hour. On day 5 the one hour seeds had grown an average of 64 mm, the 7 hour seeds averaged 94mm, and the 24 hour seeds averaged 85mm. On the first day the 1 hour seeds averaged 0.4mm and the 7 hour and 24 hour seeds were tied at 0.7mm. The next day the 7 hour seeds pulled ahead of the 24 hour seeds with 9mm against 8.2mm. The 7 hour seeds stayed ahead until the last day which made us curious about what was happening. These results surprised me very much. I expected the 24 hour seeds to grow much longer and faster then the 7 hour seeds, but that however didn’t happen. This is because when a seed is germinating they need time in the light and the shade. This is to protect the small root. The seeds don't need light to germinate which would explain how the 1 hour seeds were able to grow. They didn’t grow as long or as fast because plants do need light to grow, and those seeds had a short amount of light per day. The 24 hour seeds didn't germinate that quickly, but still were able to. They grew very fast under the light because plants need light to grow. The 7 hour seeds had a perfect balance. They were able to germinate fast while they were in the shade, and grow at a rapid pace while they were under the light. I think this test was a fair test because we had the same amount of seeds in each container, and we made sure to put the seeds in and take them out when it was time. I think our results are accurate and help prove that the seeds with 7 hours of light will germinate and grow the fastest. |
| Investigation Theme | WOS |
| Teacher Name | Evelyn Gray |
| School Name | DeWitt Middle School |
| Session | Spring 2022 |