Writing Guidelines for the Science Department  

In science courses, students will be expected to write short answer responses, essays, and research papers as they are described earlier in this handbook. In addition, students in science courses will be required to write laboratory reports and to do elaborate independent science research projects, both of which have fairly unique styles. The purpose of this section of the manual is to provide students with a set of guidelines to follow when completing these two important types of assignments.

Writing Laboratory Reports

Almost every science course requires students to write laboratory reports. These reports, in most cases, consist of four general sections. The following guide is intended to assist students in developing quality laboratory reports.

 Each laboratory report starts with a title.  The title is intended to tell the reader, in a clear manner, what experiment or project is being presented. The following sections reflect the general format of a laboratory report.

I. Purpose

II. Methods

III. Results

IV. Discussion

 • The Purpose:
This section tells the reader, in clear language, why you are doing the experiment or conducting the project. It should include any previous literature you may have read which relates to your project. Further, a good purpose should include a description of what you are trying to achieve. The purpose section should also contain a hypothesis, which should be supported by any prior work cited or referenced.

•  The Methods:
A methods section describes what you did and is sometimes called a procedures section. It is usually written in a chronological manner and describes exactly what you did in your experiment. It often includes the conditions under which the experiment was conducted. For example, you may include items such as room temperature and barometric pressure if your experiment dealt with the gas laws in chemistry or physics. A good methods section is one where other students who read your work can come into the laboratory and repeat the exact steps   you followed and get essentially the same results from their work. Also, a methods section often includes diagrams or drawings of a lab setup or apparatus used in the experiment. In addition, chemical equations and/or mathematical formulas are also appropriate in this section.

•  The Results:
The results section is sometimes called the data section. In this section, the                   experimenter reports what was found or learned from the experiment. This section often includes data, either throughout the text or in tabular form.   Drawings are also appropriate for this section to better explain to the reader the findings of the experiment. The results section would include changes that may have occurred during the conduct of the experiment. For example, if the experiment covered more than one day, any change in room temperature would be noted. This section would often include charts or graphs, which would help to clarify the data or present them in an alternative manner. Equations are often included in this section, especially those that are part of the study.        

•  The Discussion:
This section essentially explains to the reader your interpretation of what the experiment revealed. Your findings may be relatively brief or require you to write several paragraphs. In either case, the discussion includes a number of key components or items: What can you conclude from performing this experiment? How reliable are the results? If someone were to repeat your methods, would they draw the same conclusion? Other items in this section include a discussion of the errors that crept into the experiment, including how another student or investigator could modify the experiment to eliminate the errors. The discussion section should include a “handle,” something that gives the next experimenter something to continue to study in your work. Handles often include those items you would have included had you thought more clearly or simply had more time to perform the study. Finally, this section often includes subject specific questions as part of the laboratory exercise, as well as those posed by the teacher.

Writing Requirements for Independent Science Research Projects
In addition to writing a standard “laboratory report,” which is the predominant aspect of writing in the Science Department, many science classes require students to do independent “investigative style” research projects. The independent research project is a more formal assignment requiring full application of the scientific method. Unlike a standard laboratory assignment, in which students are in most cases simply executing a clearly described experiment, the independent research project requires the student to choose a topic or “problem” to study, do background research to familiarize themselves with the topic, formulate a hypothesis to solve the problem, design and conduct an experiment to test the hypothesis, analyze the data (results), and write a conclusion that supports or disputes the hypothesis.

The general format for the independent research project in most science classes requires students to write a research plan (which must be approved by the teacher prior to starting experimentation) and to write a research report (a laboratory report summarizing the findings):

1. Research Plan  - The research plan is a report that must include:
a.The problem/topic of study (introduction with background info.)
b. A clearly stated hypothesis
c.A methods section (detailed procedure for testing hypothesis)
d. Documentation (MLA or APA style)        

2. Research Report  - The research report is a full laboratory report (see the laboratory report section of this manual for full details) that must include the following:
a. Introduction (including information from the research plan)
b. Method (the experimental procedure outlined in the research plan)
c. Data (the measurements recorded in a required data notebook)
d. Results (calculation, graphs, etc.)
e.  Conclusion