Homestead Education Team
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My First Introduction to a Lab Experiment Notebook
The first time I was truly exposed to a lab experiment notebook was when I was in my junior year of college. Well, I guess that is not entirely true; in high school and my early college years, we were usually given lab pages from a printout or an assigned workbook. It was my junior year when we were required to purchase and properly fill a lab notebook for my livestock nutrition class. This was when I understood the importance of following through with all the little details of a lab experiment notebook to be an efficient scientist.
A lab experiment notebook should be able to be reproduced by any other scientist, whether they are testing/reviewing your methods or you are a student and need to review your work with peers or an instructor. When I say reproducible, I do not mean it fits on the copier. I mean that someone else could look at your methods, perform the same experiment, and potentially get comparing results. Or, follow your process and, using your notes, make adjustments to come up with better results.
Our instructor set up our class so that for each small experiment we used to determine the nutrient content of feeds, the data was used to complete a larger feeding experiment with meat lambs. After the lambs were butchered, we used the earlier data to calculate carcass weights and other feeding statistics. This is where I saw how a good lab book could change the outcome of an experiment or its results, especially when we had to average data from another student’s lab book.
Standards in Science
So, how is this reproducibility possible? It is done by every scientist setting up their lab experiment notebook the same way (or at least in the same order). Student scientists (especially high school and undergraduate students) may complete many labs in one notebook. A graduate student or professional scientist may use one of many notebooks to complete just one experiment.
When I ran food labs after college, I had two lab experiment notebooks running. One had my method written only once, then I would record data from daily production tests for months at a time and then enter that data into a spreadsheet to watch trends. My other lab experiment notebook was set up more traditionally. This is where I would test more complex and often long-term experiments, like shelf in different conditions. When I left the company, the person who took my position could pick up where I left off in my experiments.
Reproducibility is a common theme in the science field. This is why all scientific names are in Latin, so that no matter what language a scientist speaks, they can still relay information about the topic.
Why a Student Would Need a Lab Experiment Notebook
First off, I still use a similar lab/journaling structure on my farm to keep track of yields, changes, and issues over the years. But a student can use a lab experiment notebook as a requirement for a course or, as homeschooled families love to do, record a home-created science class. Many younger students will use nature journaling as a similar process. However, older students may need to turn in their lab experiment notebook or use it to prove coursework hours.
Some courses or instructors may have different requirements than the one I outline here, but the basic structure will be the same across the board.
Lab Experiment Notebook Setup
Best Practices
- Use a bound notebook (like the one shown); a looseleaf one where pages can be moved is not a best practice. The examples I have are using a spiral notebook where pages can be removed. This is not ideal, but it was all I had on hand.
- Be neat! Handwriting and proper spacing matter when interpreting data. If you make a mistake, simply cross it out with a single line, or if a whole page needs to be discarded, cross it out in one diagonal line.
- Write in ink; that way, data can not be altered.
Only write on the front of the right-hand page. Bleeding ink can distort data. - Label everything! You may not remember a number jotted down somewhere a week later.
- If you do not finish an experiment before you must move on to another one, make sure you leave blank pages to complete your original one.
Cover (And/Or First Page)
- Name
- Year
- Class
- Contact Information
Page 2- Steps of the Scientific Method with Explanation
Taking the time to write these out and having them for reference while filling out experiment pages is necessary.
- Purpose/Question – A brief description of why the experiment is being conducted. What is the learning objective or problem being solved?
- Research – What is the best approach? What results does the data suggest? Remember to find at least three reputable sources.
- Hypothesis – Based on your research, form a testable and educated prediction of what the outcome of the experiment will be.
- Experiment
- Supplies – List all necessary materials
- Procedure – List all steps in the experiment’s method so it can be reproduced by another scientist.
- Data – Record all data from the experiment including calculation, table, graphs, issues encountered, and sketches or images.
- Analysis – Record all of your observations of the experiment’s results. Answer any lab/instructor-assigned questions.
- Conclusion
- What was the final result and purpose of this lab?
- Did you achieve the goal stated in the purpose?
- Was your hypothesis correct or incorrect?
- Any major discoveries? What did you learn?
- Is there anything you would do differently if you were to do it again?
Page 3- Lab Experiment Page Requirements
- Heading
- Date
- Page #
- Experiment Title (other info)
- Body
- Purpose/Question
- Research
- Hypothesis
- Experiment
- Supplies
- Method/Procedure
- Data
- Calculations
- Sketches/images
- Tables/Graphs
- Analysis
- Observations
- Answer questions
- Conclusion
- Results
- Discussion
- Best Practices
- Do not remove or add pages
- Be neat!
- Write in ink
- Only write on the front of the right-hand page.
- Label everything!
- If you do not finish an experiment before you must move on to another one, make sure you leave blank pages to complete your original one.
Page 4- Sample Lab Experiment Page
Page 5 & 6- Reference Pages
Leave these pages blank when setting up your experiment. They are great to use later for formulas, conversion charts, or reference data.
Page 7- Table of Contents
This page should be titled “Table of Contents” and then broken into three columns for Date, Experiment Name, and Page Number. When you begin each experiment, fill in the data so that you know where to find your experiment notes. If you will be doing multiple experiments in the same lab experiment notebook, leave an extra page blank for more room to write.
Page 8- Lab Experiment Notebook Pages
This is where the labs will be recorded. Most labs will be more than one page. Make sure you leave ample room for experiments that take longer to complete if you are moving on to the next experiment.
Be Proud of What You Have Completed!
Once you have finished your lab book at the end of the course, you will feel beyond accomplished. A lab experiment notebook is a wealth of information that you completed yourself. I still have all of mine from college!
Are You Interested in a Science Course That Teaches Life Skills?
Homestead Science focuses on small-scale agriculture, life-skills, home economics, sustainability, health, and quality of character! Don’t forget that it has applied mathematics and counts as a full-year science for high school students!
