LAB REPORTS
Lab Reports need to be written in a specific order. Here are the guidelines
for the Lab Report
Title: The title should be self explanatory. When someone reads the title,
they should have a pretty good idea on what the lab was about.
Introduction: The intro should focus on three main concepts: The first
should be background information. This information should include important
information on the the topic. ex. If the lab was on a microscope, the
writer should disscuss what a microscope is, what it does, and perhaps a
brief history of it. The Second concept should state what the purpose or
problem of the lab. This is usually stated right on the data sheet(the lab
sheet the students use in the lab). The third concept should be the students
hypothesis to the problem. The student should never discuss what happened
during the course of the lab.
Methods and Materials: In this section, the students will discuss
the "grocery list" and the "recipe". This will include ALL the materials
needed for the lab and the directions on how to do the lab. These two things
are usually outlined in the data sheet, but they need to put the directions
into their words.
Results: In the results section, ONLY results should be stated or listed.
Examples would include: tables, charts, graphs, pictures, equations etc.
Students should never explain results or state conclusions in the results
section.
Discussion: This should be the largest portion of the lab report. Here the
students will show what they learned, explain results, and prove if their
hypothesis is correct or not. A good way to begin this section is use the
information from the questions on the data sheet.
Conclusion: This section is a summary of the discussion section. Students
should state the most important ideas of the lab.
Students have one week from the day of the lab to write the Lab Report. I
prefere it to be typed, but a NEATLY written paper is acceptable. Students
can also bring their Lab Report in for me to check and give back. There is
no reason why students should do poorly on Lab Reports.
PROJECTS
Projects are conducted in class either as an individual grade or as a group
project. Examples: games, diagrams, posters, etc
