Question

A student did an experiment with two identical plants, Plant 1 and Plant 2. About 10 mL fertilizer was added to Plant 1. About 200 mL of water was added to each plant every day. The height of the plants was recorded over a period of 5 weeks in the table shown below. Week Height of Plant 1 (in inches) Height of Plant 2 (in inches) 1 12.6 12.6 2 13.8 12.9 3 14.9 13.4 4 15.7 13.8 5 16.6 14.6 Based on the table, which of these conclusions is correct?

1) Fertilizer helps plants grow taller. 2) Fertilizer can help a plant survive for five days. 3) Plants need more than 200 mL of water to survive. 4) Plants need more than 10 mL fertilizer to grow in size.

Answer 1

Conclusion one, a plant can still survive without fertilizer so you can cross conclusion 2 and 3 out as options. The reason why it's 1 instead of 4 is that the data only tells you that fertilizer helps plants grow, it doesn't tell you anymore than that.

Answer 2

1) Fertilizer helps plants grow taller

Step-by-step explanation:

From the data it is clear that plant 1 outgrew plant 2 so fertilizer did help it to grow taller. Both the plants survived for five days so we can't say that fertilizer has a role in survival of plant. Again they don't need more than 200ml water everyday since they survived with it for 5 days. Plant 1 showed difference in height with just 10ml of fertilizer so it seems to be enough for the plant to grow in size.