Using the Digital Science Notepad (DSN) students go online and enter in the data from their classroom science lab experiments. Their data are then transformed into one of several formats: a professional industry lab report format, a newscast, or an historical scientific treatise modeled on the writings of Galileo. The DSN gives students a place to input and print out their lab data along with a structured format for their analyses and conclusions. The output can be saved to the desktop or printed.

Click below to launch the Digital Science Notepad

For Teachers.... Here is a handout of the DSN Lab template for you to use with your students as they are completing a lab in your classroom. This will prepare your students and save time before they enter data online. This will also help the text they enter to match the formats generated in DSN. Enjoy...

How to Use the Digital Science Notepad

While DSN provides a structure for beginning science students to enter data and see it transformed, it also provides motivation for completing the labs as their data is needed to make the transformations work. They see their own names and information in the final product. To guide data collection during the experiment in your classroom or lab, you may want to print the data entry form or have it projected on screen. Students then enter their data collection, analysis, and conclusions. They enter it into the DSN either through your classroom computer, in a computer lab, or at home on a computer for homework. Their data can be transformed into all of the formats offered, using the initial data entered, and their final products can be downloaded and saved, printed, or E-mailed.

Ideas for Teaching:

In addition to structuring beginning student writing and providing the motivation for complete data collection and write-up, the resulting transformations allow teachers to talk to students about communication in the sciences. Some students may be interested in the differences in the purpose evident across transformations, the impact of the intended audience on form, and the role of informal and formal language between the different transformations. Other students may be more interested in the historical changes between the way scientific discovery was reported in the time of Galileo as compared to today.

Caution! A word of advice…

Student work is not saved on the Website. Students must be directed to print or save their work.
You will want to practice before you use this in your classroom.

Please note that DSN does not correct, verify, or analyze student data – that is the role of the teacher working with the student. While we have tested the DSN you may find at times the phrasing of student writing does not align with the transformation (for example if a student enters data incorrectly or does not frame their writing in response to the specific prompt). While we make every effort to make the DSN work as smoothly as possible you will want to review the work with your students.

Based on Prior Research in Low-Income Schools

In the course of our study in low-income high schools using NASA’s Virtual Lab, funded by the BellSouth Foundation, teachers were able to share their needs and priorities regarding the skills and content they have to teach in order to support student inquiry using The Virtual Lab. Among their contributions, our researchers noted that teachers need support when helping students to learn how to experiment and how to write and speak effectively in their science classrooms.