Writing Assignment
Biology 212
Winter 2006
Scientific writing
One of the objectives of the laboratory experience this term is to develop your writing
skills. In science, writing is an important means of communication. A scientific paper
usually includes the following parts: a title (statement of the question or problem), an
abstract (short summary of the paper), an introduction (background and significance of
the research, including any hypotheses and predictions), a materials and methods section
(report of exactly what you did), a results section (presentation of data), a discussion
section (interpretation and discussion of results), and references (books and periodicals
cited in the introduction or discussion sections).
Assignment
Write a lab report on your experiment investigating the effect of moist and dry conditions
on optimum interplant distance that maximizes areal yield (yield per square meter of field
surface). The report should be typed with double-spaced text, 12 pt font and pages
numbered with the following components.
Title
The title should be as short as possible and as long as necessary to communicate to the
reader the question being answered in the paper.
(Additional resource http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/SciRep_Title.html)
Introduction
This section gives the background and rationale for your research question. In other
words, it places your research in context. This introduction section includes your
research question, hypothesis, and prediction. The background and rationale information
should be no more than 1-1.5 pages. You must give credit for any information that you
gain from other sources and present in your report by citing the reference. Two
references are required.
(Additional resource http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/SciRep_Intro.html)
Methods
Give a brief description of your experimental design (1 paragraph), which includes your
independent and dependent variables.
Results
This section, which is the central section of a scientific paper, has two components: (1)
text describing your results (1-2 paragraphs) and (2) a figure (graph) summarizing your
data. The figure (graph) needs to have a complete title. Cite your figure in the text
portion of your report. Do not interpret your results in this section. Review pages 14-18
in your lab manual for tips on presenting and analyzing results. Use the guidelines in the
handout attached to your in-lab assignment to prepare your graphs.
Discussion
(Additional resource http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/SciRep_Disc.html)
In this section, you will analyze and interpret the results of your experiment. Use the
following guidelines from your lab manual Appendix A: “Simply restating the results is
not interpretation. The Discussion must provide a context for understanding the
significance of the results. Explain why you observed these results and how these results
contribute to our knowledge. Your results will support or confirm your hypothesis or will
negate, refute or contradict your hypothesis but the word “prove” is not appropriate in
scientific writing. If you results do not support your hypothesis, you must still state why
you think this occurred. Support your ideas from other work (book, lectures or outside
reading of scientific literature). State your conclusions in this section.
“Complete your Introduction and Results sections before you begin writing the
Discussion. The figures and tables in the Results section will be particularly important as
you begin to think about your discussion. The graphs allow you to visualize the effects
that the independent variables had on the dependent variables in your experiment.
Studying these data will be one of the first steps in interpreting your results. As you study
the information in the introduction section and your data in the Results section, write
down relationships and integrate these relationships into a rough draft of your discussion.
“The following steps may be helpful as you begin to outline your discussion and before
you write the narrative:
 Restate your question, hypothesis, and prediction.
 Write down the specific data, including results of statistical tests.
 State whether your results did or did not confirm your prediction and support or
negate your hypothesis.
 Write down what you know about the biology involved in your experiment. How
do your results fit in with what you know? What is the significance of your
results?
 How do your results support or conflict with previous work? Include references
to this work.
 Clearly state your conclusions.
 You are now ready to write the narrative for the Discussion. Integrate all of the
above information into several simple, clear, concise paragraphs. Discuss the
results; do no simply restate the data. Refer to other work to support your ideas”.
References You must give credit to any information that you gain from other sources
and that you present in your report. At least two references are required. See resources
below for guidelines on citing references. References need to be listed in alphabetical
order by author’s last name.
No references from the Internet will be accepted for this assignment unless from an online peer reviewed scientific journal.
 How to decide what information must be referenced
http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/QPA_plagiarism.html
 How to write a successful summary without plagiarizing
http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/QuotingSources.html
http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/QuotingSources.html
 How to cite references
http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/DocCBE_NameYear_Intext.html
http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/DocCBE_NameYear_RefList.html
Additional Resources
 The Biology web site, http://osu.orst.edu/instruct/bi212/writew06.htm, has
information on resources for writing and library research.
 General information on writing a scientific report
Appendix A Scientific Writing in your lab manual.
 Evaluation form included with this assignment sheet.
 Be sure to talk with your Lab Instructor if you have any questions.
Due Date
Your Lab Instructor will assign the due date. The grade on late reports will decrease 5%
per day.
Format
Evaluation
Your lab report will be evaluated on the content (4 points) and the effectiveness of your
communication, including text and figures (5 points). See the attached page for a sample
evaluation form.
Evaluation of Lab Report on Photosynthesis
Biology 212
Winter 2006
CONTENT
Title
Introduction
Background and rationale
Research question
Hypothesis
Prediction
Methods
Description of experimental design
Procedures
Results
Table or figure (graph)
Text describing results
Discussion
COMMUNICATION
Writing
Grammar, spelling, punctuation,
capitalization
Sentence construction
Paragraph structure: sentences in
logical order supporting one main
idea in each paragraph
Organization of paragraphs
Conciseness and clarity of writing
References
Required number
Listed in Reference section
Cited in text
Figure (graph)
Each title tells a complete story
Organization of report
Headings and subheadings included
Double-space text
Pages Numbered
COMMENTS