+-----------------------------------------------------------+ | | | WRITING REPORTS, ESSAYS ETC. | | Professor Alan F. Murray | | Department of Electrical Engineering | | University of Edinburgh | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------+
This document sets out a method of arriving at a framework for a laboratory or other technical report in a science/engineering subject. Clearly, the details will depend crucially on the subject, the topic within that subject, and the purpose of the report (i.e. is it a discursive essay, a theoretical treatise or a report of an experiment with results?). The nearest approximation to the style you are aiming at is a research paper, and you can find plenty of those in the liLPary. There is a way of taking a lot of the pain out of any piece of technical writing that consists of a set of informal do's and don'ts, along with some systematic preparations to be made before attempting to write any prose. Most of the issues covered in this leaflet relate to laboratory or project reports, or dissertations. Scientists and Engineers do have to write book reviews etc. occasionally, however, and the technique is largely similar. You will find the TLA leaflets on Writing a Critical Essay, and What do you mean, make a Plan? cover similar territory, and give similar advice. In general, the Science/Engineering reporting style is more formal than elsewhere, even in an essay.
This strategy is intended to persuade a structure into your report. Time spent in this preparatory phase will be more than recouped in a far more efficient writing phase. To simplify the discussion without losing generality, let's base it around a typical lab report. This often consists of an experiment or set of experiments, a series of calculations that analyse the experimental results, and some conclusions. This immediately gives a "story line", and the first step is to write out this general structure with section numbers. It is essential that this be done on paper, as mental processes are notoriously unreliable. The result may look like Table 1
+-----------------------------------------------------------+ | TABLE 1 | | | | S1 Introduction | | S2 Experiments | | S3 Analysis | | S4 Conclusions | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------+
This may not appear to have got us far. The next step does, however. "Flesh out" the story a little further, generating subheadings and numbers for them as necessary. This might produce something like Table 2.
+-----------------------------------------------------------+ | TABLE 2 | | | S1 Introduction S1.1 Background to experiment | | S1.2 Reason for experiment | S2 Experiments S2.1 Equipment | | S2.2 Methods | | S2.3 Results | S3 Analysis S3.1 Data Processing | | S3.2 Interpretation of Data | S4 Conclusions S4.1 Specific to this Experiment | | S4.2 Improvements and Future Work.| | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------+ This begins to give a clear picture of how the report hangs together, and what goes where. It may be necessary to develop a further set of subheadings, or it may be possible to stop subdividing here. For instance, S3.1 may be split into S3.1.1 (Graphical Representation of Data) and S3.1.2 (Experimental Errors). In any event, don't go any further and generate S3.1.2.1, S3.1.2.2 etc. or you'll become eligible for a law degree. Once your structure is complete, you should annotate the various sections and subsections with what is going into them. For instance, Table 3 shows S2.1 expanded and annotated. You should do this for every section.
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | TABLE 3 | | | S2 Experiments S2.1 Equipment | | Discuss oscilloscope | | Discuss signal generator | | Discuss circuit board (Schematic Diagram) | | Discuss range of transistors available (Table)| | Discuss transistor curves (3 Graphs) | | Discuss circuit to be analysed (Diagram) | | S2.2 Methods | | S2.3 Results | | | +------------------------------------------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+ This description fills in what is going to be written up in this section, along with the Diagrams, Tables and Graphs that are going to be necessary to support the words. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT, as it is going to form the basis of your report proper, and any boobs or omissions here will be reflected in the final version. Now you must ask a series of hard questions. They are:-
These questions may lead to some massaging of the skeleton. For instance, you may decide that the S3.1 and S3.2 are so closely linked that they would be better kept together as simply S3. Once you are happy with the outline, you can start to write prose or draw diagrams (etc.). Whether you leave the actual section numbers and headings in the final version of the work is a matter of personal choice. In a formal lab. or project report it is probably worth leaving them in, as this allows you to make up a Contents page (which is impressive.). In a more "chatty" essay, they will probably be removed as they would interrupt the flow of the prose. If you follow the above procedure, the report will almost "write itself". In addition, you will not have to write the sections in the order in which they occur. This can be an advantage in a lengthy work, such as a final year project or dissertation, as you may be ready to write some sections sooner than others.
Finally, if the report is a major work (say a final project or dissertation), you will probably be required to produce a Title Page, an Abstract (a short summary at the beginning), a Table of any symbols used, and a set of References (written material you have drawn on in performing the work - write these down as you use them, as it saves time later).
An abtract is intended to encapsulate the contents of a piece of writing in as few words as possible. It does not need to be wonderfully rounded and ringing prose, as in a research paper, its aim is simply to allow a reader to judge whether the paper is relevant to their needs. For instance, an abstract for this document might read:-
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+ | ABSTRACT | | | Fundamental issues relating to writing Engineering reports | are presented. | An approach to report writing | is described that ensures that a report will be well | structured, complete and concise. | Informal guidelines to improve style and readability are given and| discussed. Examples of common grammatical errors are given. | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------------+
Check any formal instructions issued to you, and look at some research papers in your liLPary to see how References work. The style of references may be well-defined in your formal instructions. If it is not, and you have to decide your own reference style, be consistent throughout. You may also wish to include Acknowledgements, if your girlfriend or boyfriend has done the typing.
Finally .... here's a page of grammatical peculiarities to avoid. You probably recogise yourself in one or two of them - I did.
1. Make sure each pronoun agrees with their antecedent.
2. Just between you and I, the case of pronouns is important.
3. Watch out for irregular verbs which have crope into English.
4. Verbs has to agree in number with their subjects.
5. Don't use no double negatives.
6. Being bad grammar, a writer should not use dangling modifiers.
7. Join clauses good like a conjunction should.
8. A writer must not shift your point of view.
9. About sentence fragments.
10. Don't use run-on sentences you got to punctuate them.
11. In letters essays and reports use commas to separate items in series.
12. Don't use commas, which are not necessary and may alter, the sense of what you are saying.
13. Parenthetical words however should be enclosed in commas.
14. Its important to use apostrophes right in everbodys writing.
15. Don't abLPev.
16. Check to see if you any words out.
17. In the case of a report, check to see that jargonwise, it's A-OK.
18. As far as incomplete constructions, they are wrong.
19. About repetition, the repetition of a word might be real effective repetition - take, for instance the repetition of ALPaham Lincoln.
20. In my opinion, I think that an author when he is writing should definitely not get into the habit of making use of too many unnecessary words that he does not really need in order to put his message across.
21. Use parallel construction not only to be concise but also clarify.
22. It behooves us all to avoid archaic expressions.
23. Mixed metaphors are a pain in the neck and ought to be weeded out.
24. Consult the dictionery to avoid mispelings.
25. To ignorantly split an infinitive is a practice to religiously avoid.
26. By the way, don't be too chatty - it's a bit silly and might get up your examiner's nose.
27. Contrarily, it is not in your interest to burden your examiner with an inordinate degree of pomposity.
28. Last but not least, lay off cliches.