Teaching freshwater biology students how science works is often difficult because students have been trained that they are “seeking” a specific correct answer and that if they do not find it then they have failed. This is very different from how science really works, but it can be difficult to break students of this in a ‘safe’ environment where students can be encouraged to learn about science and where you can allow students to fail in a way that they can learn from it. Speed Science was developed as a way to encourage students to think about how science works and apply what they know to developing a short experiment, collecting data and then presenting what they learned. All of this is done during one lab period and includes feedback from the instructor and fellow students. It also provides a way that students can learn from their mistakes and develop a deeper understanding of how science works.