Members of a team of educators and university students participating in the project, Pittsburgh Partnership for Energizing Science in Urban Schools, addressed the issue of helping students develop investigative skills within the context of an introductory science unit for fourth graders. The unit focuses on data-collection techniques and is a component of the district's required curriculum. It contains four hands-on investigations, each involving a different technique: rubbing, carbon printing, chromatography, and reflecting. The approach described here can be used as a model to transform the skills learned in a science classroom from general to investigative ones. (Contains 2 resources.)