The issue
What to do
Answer the research questions you wrote in the ‘what I want to know’ column of the grid below.
1. Look at the sources below to see which ones are relevant. List these in the ‘how I will find out’ column.
2. Use the sources of information to answer them and complete the ‘what I have learnt’ column.
3. You are now ready to communicate your findings:
Sources
Use your scientific skills to decide which sources are relevant and to extract the important information. The ‘thinking guides’ below can help you. Real sources come from websites. Adapted sources have been edited to make them easier to read.
Real sources
Grass-resin casing
Video and news article An engineer talks about how his company build smartphone casings out of grass.
Scientific paper An investigation into the properties of a resin and grass composite material. You can read the abstract at the start which is a summary of the whole paper. An adapted version is also available that contains simpler language.
Tree fibre circuit board
Scientific paper This was written by expert scientists so contains some technical language. You can use the adapted version instead.
Press release This was written by the university where the research mentioned above was carried out. There is an adapted version if you prefer.
Sugar battery
Scientific paper This was written by scientists who are developing sugar batteries. There is an adapted version for you to read.
Web article This contains useful information about sugar batteries. You can also read the adapted version.
Video Scientists developing sugar batteries discuss how they work and the advantages of them over conventional lithium batteries.
Adapted sources
These have been edited to make them easier to read:
Grass-resin casing
Data sheet
Scientific paper
Tree fibre circuit board
Press release
Scientific paper
Sugar battery
Web article
Scientific paper
Thinking guides
Thinking guides
These sheets help you think through the skills you need to extract information and to make decisions:
Interrogate sources thinking guide: This will help you to decide how reliable sources such as news articles, press releases and scientific papers are. Use it with the sugar batteries information.
Analyse patterns thinking guide: Use this to help you work out what the data in the tree fibre circuit boards sources mean. If you need more guidance, ask your teacher for a different version of the guide.
Critique claims thinking guide: Use this with the grass-resin casing sources to help you to decide if the claims made by the manufacturers are believable. If you need more guidance, ask your teacher for a different version of the guide.