While we grade your first lab reports, we want to give you some notes in
general about we expect for the second round of reports:
- Bring a hard copy of your report to class. STAPLE!
- Abstracts should be short and concise, and contain: a sentence or two
summarizing the lab, and a sentence or two describing the results you
obtained. Save background information and why you did the experiment for
the Introduction.
- Make sure your report is readable - most of the reports so far looked
good. Make sure that your sections have a space in between them, that your
section titles are not separated from the sections, your tables are intact,
and equations are clear.
- If you use Word find a way to make your equations readable. If anyone needs
help with LaTeX please let us know - there is a bit of a learning curve
since it is a very different method of preparing documents than more
familiar word processors, but once you understand the method it is actually
easier for scientific papers.
- Keep the report to a reasonable # of pages. There is no hard limit, and
do make sure you don't leave important information out, but do not print
out pages and pages of tables of data and calculations. Provide a summary
of important data and equations.
A very important skill is being able to explain your experiments and
results fully and clearly while being as concise as possible - this is an
important goal of this course.
If anything about writing the reports is unclear please ask us.