Carrying out experiments is only half of the work that scientists have to accomplish. Almost always, they have to communicate their findings to colleagues, peers, funding agencies, and the scientific community in general. Publishing articles in professional journals is the method in which scientists communicate with each other. These articles range from short communications of one or two pages to full-length manuscripts that can span many pages of a printed journal.
A quick survey of a scientific journal reveals that scientists use a specific style of writing. Some adjectives that are commonly used to describe the style of scientific writing are: pithy, lean, to-the-point, concise, exact. Additionally, every field tends to have its own individual style, language, and way of doing things.
The practice of scientific writing starts early on in the sciences. Graduate studies in the life sciences culminate with a very comprehensive written document—a thesis if you are a Master’s student or a dissertation if you are a PhD student. Here at WPI, you will be required to write up your MQP very similar to a Master’s thesis. In preparation for this, lab report writing is used in the biology labs to initiate students into the realm of scientific writing.
Lab reports have some of the components that are found in professional journal articles and so they are a good place to start practicing how to communicate with other scientists. Writing in biology can be different than any other type of writing you have done previously. The following can be used as a guide to writing lab reports in the introductory biology labs.
Lab Report Components
A good lab report should read like a story—the story of your experiment! You can think about it in the sense that you are answering the following questions to piece the story together:
Why did you do the experiment?
A good lab report always starts with an introduction. Through the introduction, you want to put the reader on the map and tell them why you are about to do the experiment. You should tell the reader about objectives of the experiment.
The introduction should contain relevant background to the experiments from outside sources. You need to bring the reader up to speed by giving s/he enough background so that s/he can understand why you are doing the experiment. For some labs, this may be background on a technique that includes why and how it is used. But, for other labs in which you are really investigating a new question it needs to include what previous work has been done to address the question you are investigating.
Either way, any time an outside source is used to gather information for your introduction it must be properly cited. The end of your report should contain a list of all the references you used to construct the background information. Within the text, where you used the source, you should make a citation that points the reader to the appropriate source in your reference section.
There are many citation and reference styles and examples of these can be found in any technical writing manual. There are several reference styles that are appropriate for the lab report. The Council of Science Editors (CSE) citation style is a good choice because it widely used and accepted in the biological sciences. The CSE style has a both a numerical citation system and an author/date citation system. Either of these systems is appropriate for the lab report as long as you remain consistent. Later, when you publish in professional journals, there will be explicit instructions to the style to use so it is not so important to learn one particular style as opposed to another. The Chicago Manual of Style or the American Psychological Association (APA) methods are also acceptable.
How did you do it?
The materials and methods should be a concise how to for the reader. If someone wanted to repeat your experiments, s/he should be able to glean everything they need to know from your materials and methods. This is the full disclosure of the science world! Part of the unspoken agreement among scientists is that there is nothing to hide. You are putting your experiments out there so that others can learn from them and even repeat them. So, your materials and methods should be detailed enough for that to be possible.
What happened?
The results section is where you will present your data and findings. But, it is also still a crucial part of the storytelling and should therefore include text. The results section is not just a place to plop down your tables and charts! You need to continue to bring the reader along by introducing each piece of data in the text and also by properly titling and captioning each figure or table that is included. If you do not refer to it in the results text, then it should not be in the report!
Results text writing is sometimes the hardest part of the lab report for students. It is hard to separate the presentation of the data (results) from the analysis of the data (discussion). One way of thinking about it is that the results is where the data is described. A figure is introduced and then the major highlights of that figure are talked about. You want to draw the reader’s eye to important components of the data by actually pointing it out to them and telling them to go look there. The following is an example of two figures that are described and referred to with appropriate text:
Order is important! You are the storyteller so make sure you lay out the data in a way that helps you tell the story. Sometimes we do things in the laboratory out of sequence to save time. This does not mean that you have to present your data precisely in the order you collected it. You should look at all of your data and then put it in an order that makes sense in relation to the objectives of the experiment and what you were trying to accomplish.
There is no bad data! All data belongs in the story. Even when you do not get the result you expected. If an experiment failed, say so. Remember, full disclosure in science!
What do you think it all means?
Once you have presented all of your data, now it is time to make sense of it all. In the discussion, you should give your thoughts on what your data means. It should not be a repeat description of the data from the results text but instead a passage where you wrap up the story. Interpretations of the data should be made. Implications of the data should be discussed as well as links to other accepted findings or theories. The following is an example of discussion text for the results described above:
The discussion is also a place to pose the next set of questions. Are there any holes in your experiment that you see now that it is done? Do your data suggest any further experiments that need to be done? Rarely does one set of experiments lead to a final piece of work. Rather, it provides the launching point for the next set of experiments and the next paper!
Writing Resources
It is a good idea to keep a technical writing manual at your elbow while you are writing. The following may be a useful resource for writing your lab reports:
Successful Lab Reports, A Manual for Science Students by Christopher S. Lobban & Maria Schefter (ISBN 0-521-40741-9)
You can obtain a copy of this from the WPI bookstore or Amazon.com. Also, there are copies available in the file folders outside the biology computer lab on the 2nd floor of Salisbury. Don’t forget, your instructors and TAs are excellent resources for information on scientific writing and WPI has a writing center located on the 2nd Floor of the Project Center.
Good Luck!
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Portfolio: Learning to Write Assignment
Lab Report Sequencing
Purpose
Traditionally in the introductory labs I teach, students submit six formal lab reports over the course of seven weeks. They only have the opportunity to rewrite the first lab after they receive comments and a grade. Ideally, students would receive their graded labs back before they turn in the next report. However, in reality, this is not always the case. The courses tend to enroll about 60 students which amounts to a 20 report per week grading load for each instructor or teaching assistant. Without revision opportunities nor class time which focuses on lab report writing, students are left practicing writing lab reports instead of learning how to write them.
Instead of having students write complete lab reports from the start of the term they will write pieces of the lab report throughout the term. This will allow them to receive feedback on the separate pieces in the first five weeks, and then have time to apply what they have learned to a full report format in the last two weeks.
Justification
A good laboratory report starts with a good results section. And, because this is a laboratory course where students perform experiments and collect data, it is a logical place to start. In my experience, the results section is where most students lose a majority points on a lab. The number one reason is that they never include result text—they just plop down some tables, graphs, or pictures. I feel that spending time working on a result section in Lab 1 will go a long way in helping them form a foundation from where they will write a successful report.
The move from the results section to the discussion section is also a place where students tend to stumble. Often, there will be results text in the discussion and vice versa. When provided with questions to aid in the development of the discussion, students tend to answer each question in paragraph form and fail to tie the paragraphs together or to the lab itself. Therefore, after mastering the results section students will work on writing a results and discussion section for Lab 2.
In the third lab we will begin the introduction that includes background. We will spend two weeks working on this with in class activities that focus on both the writing of the introduction and the use of references and citations in the introduction. Because the introduction is a complex section which includes background, objectives, and in text citations I think students will be best served by stretching activities out over two weeks in order to touch on all of the components of a good introduction.
From there, students will begin to work on their final project where they design their own experiment and write their own materials and methods (materials and methods are essentially provided in all the prescribed labs via the lab protocol). We will spend time in class providing information and instruction on project specific materials and methods. Students will turn in a draft of their project introduction, materials and methods, and reference section and receive feedback before they execute the final experiments. In the final week, students will revise the above and add the results and discussion to form the final, full lab report.
Purpose
Traditionally in the introductory labs I teach, students submit six formal lab reports over the course of seven weeks. They only have the opportunity to rewrite the first lab after they receive comments and a grade. Ideally, students would receive their graded labs back before they turn in the next report. However, in reality, this is not always the case. The courses tend to enroll about 60 students which amounts to a 20 report per week grading load for each instructor or teaching assistant. Without revision opportunities nor class time which focuses on lab report writing, students are left practicing writing lab reports instead of learning how to write them.
Instead of having students write complete lab reports from the start of the term they will write pieces of the lab report throughout the term. This will allow them to receive feedback on the separate pieces in the first five weeks, and then have time to apply what they have learned to a full report format in the last two weeks.
Justification
A good laboratory report starts with a good results section. And, because this is a laboratory course where students perform experiments and collect data, it is a logical place to start. In my experience, the results section is where most students lose a majority points on a lab. The number one reason is that they never include result text—they just plop down some tables, graphs, or pictures. I feel that spending time working on a result section in Lab 1 will go a long way in helping them form a foundation from where they will write a successful report.
The move from the results section to the discussion section is also a place where students tend to stumble. Often, there will be results text in the discussion and vice versa. When provided with questions to aid in the development of the discussion, students tend to answer each question in paragraph form and fail to tie the paragraphs together or to the lab itself. Therefore, after mastering the results section students will work on writing a results and discussion section for Lab 2.
In the third lab we will begin the introduction that includes background. We will spend two weeks working on this with in class activities that focus on both the writing of the introduction and the use of references and citations in the introduction. Because the introduction is a complex section which includes background, objectives, and in text citations I think students will be best served by stretching activities out over two weeks in order to touch on all of the components of a good introduction.
From there, students will begin to work on their final project where they design their own experiment and write their own materials and methods (materials and methods are essentially provided in all the prescribed labs via the lab protocol). We will spend time in class providing information and instruction on project specific materials and methods. Students will turn in a draft of their project introduction, materials and methods, and reference section and receive feedback before they execute the final experiments. In the final week, students will revise the above and add the results and discussion to form the final, full lab report.
Portfolio: Writing to Learn Assignment
The Lab Notebook Blog
Purpose:
Traditionally, in the introductory labs that I teach, the only writing assignments are formal lab reports. We no longer require students to keep and turn in a lab notebook. As a way to integrate some exploratory writing into my course, I will require students to keep a blog in ‘lab notebook’ format.
I feel that this technological approach to the lab notebook will appeal to students and encourage collaboration among lab partners and lab group members. We do a lot of data sharing in our labs so this will be a convenient way for students to communicate and share data as an added benefit. Additionally, because we are not requiring every lab to be formally written up (see Learning to Write assignment), the blog will provide an opportunity for some writing and thinking about all of the labs. Students will still be required to learn the content of every lab, so having a blog assignment for every lab can help ensure students are properly exposed to and are actively thinking about said content.
The lab notebook blog will be a place for students to record:
1) their thoughts before they do the lab (upon reading the protocol)
2) what actually transpired in lab including their data
3) their reflections on what really happened and how it may differ from what they thought would happen
Justification
Instructors can peruse blog entries and look for general misunderstandings from the laboratory and/or concepts covered in labs. Instructors can glean key points and information and present them at the next lecture as way of clearing confusion and giving guidance/suggestions before student’s write an assignment based on the lab procedure and data collected.
Students will have an opportunity to collect data in a place where peers and instructors can easily view and comment. Students will be able to informally write out their thoughts and begin some analysis of the data. Students will collaborate and share observations by commenting on each other’s blogs.
Purpose:
Traditionally, in the introductory labs that I teach, the only writing assignments are formal lab reports. We no longer require students to keep and turn in a lab notebook. As a way to integrate some exploratory writing into my course, I will require students to keep a blog in ‘lab notebook’ format.
I feel that this technological approach to the lab notebook will appeal to students and encourage collaboration among lab partners and lab group members. We do a lot of data sharing in our labs so this will be a convenient way for students to communicate and share data as an added benefit. Additionally, because we are not requiring every lab to be formally written up (see Learning to Write assignment), the blog will provide an opportunity for some writing and thinking about all of the labs. Students will still be required to learn the content of every lab, so having a blog assignment for every lab can help ensure students are properly exposed to and are actively thinking about said content.
The lab notebook blog will be a place for students to record:
1) their thoughts before they do the lab (upon reading the protocol)
2) what actually transpired in lab including their data
3) their reflections on what really happened and how it may differ from what they thought would happen
Justification
Instructors can peruse blog entries and look for general misunderstandings from the laboratory and/or concepts covered in labs. Instructors can glean key points and information and present them at the next lecture as way of clearing confusion and giving guidance/suggestions before student’s write an assignment based on the lab procedure and data collected.
Students will have an opportunity to collect data in a place where peers and instructors can easily view and comment. Students will be able to informally write out their thoughts and begin some analysis of the data. Students will collaborate and share observations by commenting on each other’s blogs.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)