How to Write up Activities
(the "5-point plan")

Writeup Example

"...for all the excitement of discovering a new star or nebula, a good scientist was ultimately one who took care to consider the minutest of details, weighing each tiny component that made up an observation."

George Johnson, Miss Leavitt's Stars

All activities for students in internet classes should be submitted via the submission form provided.  Online students should NOT email activities nor send any attached files without prior permission. Students in on-campus, lecture classes should submit activities in properly formatted style, printed on paper, unless given permission otherwise. Online students should not write or edit their submission in the submit form. Do that offline in a text editor. You may submit only once, so cut and paste your report into the submit form only when you are sure you are ready to submit. Unless directed otherwise, proper write-ups for this class, consist of the following five parts: 

#1 HEADER:  Your write up should start with the following information in this format:

#2 STATEMENT OF PURPOSE: This should include a paragraph describing what you are hoping to learn or demonstrate, or otherwise what your purpose is in performing the activity. While you don't have to write more than a few sentences, you should put some thought into this and provide more than "I hope to understand how stars move." Be specific and concise.

#3 STATEMENT OF PROCEDURE: You must tell what you did and how you did it. To a large extent this is the material you are given with the assignment, but I do not want you simply to copy that material. Give it in your own words, and include any significant details. Again, the point here is that someone at a later date can follow your writing and reproduce your experiment or set up the observation the same as yours, as far as changing circumstances permit.

#4 DATA, OBSERVATIONS and RESULTS:  Science requires evidence. It is not just about what you think about something, or what you look up in a book or online. You must have evidence, and you must show it. You will not always have numerical data, but you will always have some kind of results. Sometimes the data may simply be a description of your observation. For online students, an submit form is provided for you. For lecture-class students (who turn in their reports in paper form), make up a table as appropriate. (If you cannot place your numeric data into a table, at least do not lump it all into a single paragraph. See Non-Table Data Example.) Show all of your Data, Measurements  and Calculations! You must show all the data and calculations so that I can figure out what you did wrong if your answer is wrong. If you take measurements in inches and then convert into millimeters (for example), you must show your original data (in inches or whatever) as well as any converted data (in millimeters or whatever).  This is absolutely essential. You must show your data, measurements and  calculations (if any).  Online students cannot give fancy displays of calculations, such as you might do in Excel. However, you can still provide samples of your calculations.  This is your evidence of having done the activity. Without it, you will lose points or possibly will receive a zero. 

For online students, an input form will be provided for you. For lecture-class students (who turn in their reports in paper form), make up a table as appropriate. (If you cannot place your numeric data into a table, at least do not lump it all into a single paragraph. See Non-Table Data Example.) Here is an example for lecture class students:

If your data or results are large enough or small enough to require "powers of ten" or "scientific notation". that must be included as well, along with the proper units (such as m, km, kg, hours, seconds, whatever is appropriate). If you take multiple sets of data, you must show ALL of it, even if it is all the same. Average your results, not your data. Say you measure something 10 times -- then you have to list all 10 measurements. Find your results for each set of measurements, and then average the results by adding them all together and dividing the result by 10 (or whoever many measurements you made).

Once you have taken your data and performed any necessary calculations, you should check your book, some other resource or the Internet for the accepted value. Compare this to your result and show me in the write up how your result compares with the known result. This is a requirement and if you fail to do it when it is esily possible, you may lose points. By the way, I know what the reasonable results are, so if your result is too far off or far too accurate, that raises "red flags" and I will become suspicious because in the past this has meant either that the student is doing something very wrong or is cheating. Also, when you look up the known result, be sure you are "companing apples to apples" so to speak. If your result is in feet and the reference you find is in meters, you need to make the proper conversion before you compare.

#5 STATEMENT OF CONCLUSIONS: Take a paragraph or so to describe what you learned, what your errors might have been, and perhaps what you would do to improve the observation or experiment. This is not the place to put your results. Results are the product of any calculations and observations your took. If the activity was to find the diameter of the Moon, your results would be your observations and your finding that the Moon is 2,000 miles across. Your conclusions, on the other hand, would be something like, "I have concluded that the Moon is much smaller than the Earth, but when compared to other "moons" in the solar system, it is respectably large." You may also include (with your conclusions) any speculations about what the results might mean. But please do not simply state your results. That is, do NOT state: "I found that the Moon is 2,000 miles across." That is for the DATA and RESULTS section.

Some but not all activities may have a list of questions to be answered. If so, they should be put immediately following the Statement of Conclusions, in list format rather than all jumbled into one paragraph. Included should be both the question and your answer. These do NOT substitute for a normal Statement of Conclusions, but are in addition to it. Failure to answer questions when posed will result in a loss of points.

* For all students: Always check what you write to be sure it is clear and sensible. Write in complete sentences. It needs to be complete but not padded with irrelevant material. The basic idea is that someone years down the line should be able to read your write-up and then be able to set up the same observation or experiment. You must give enough information that someone else could reasonably attempt to duplicate what you did. If you use resources other than your book and our class website, always credit your source! This is especially true if you paraphrase or quote from some resource. Failure to properly credit your source may be construed as plagiarism!
* For online students, unless directed otherwise, each activity will have a form into which you will type (better yet, type it in a  text processor, then cut and paste into the form) your activity submissions as outlined above. I will give you instructions on how to send your write-up in the How to Submit Activities page.
* For lecture class students, here is a complete example: Write-up Example.

Further Important Comments for Lecture Class (not Online) Students:

It is best that you compose your write-up in Microsoft Word or some other standard word processor.

Additional notes for lecture class (on-campus) students: Although you must follow the standard format outlined above, you do not have to use exactly the same typeface or sizes that I have used above. I have formatted this in a sanserif typeface called Ariel. But you may use any normal typeface such as Helvetica, Humanist, Times, Times Roman and so forth. But you are NOT to use fancy or cursive typefaces. In general, use a typeface that would be appropriate if you were writing a normal business letter.

In most cases, the activity write-ups for this course need be no longer than a single page (the equivalent of a single, typewritten page with single spacing between lines and double spacing between paragraphs). In a few cases a greater length is justified, but rarely would you need to give more than two pages.

Considering the nature of this course, I tend to be fairly lenient in most areas. This is a survey course and is not rigorous. Since we are generally not working with precision equipment (other than our eyes and brains), I can't and don't expect all your observations to be perfect.

However, it is important that you learn some basics of proper procedure, and that is why I insist that you follow a set procedure for the activity write-ups. Besides, if you follow the procedures properly, your observations and data (when there is data) should be about as accurate as can be expected under the circumstances. (Realize that under different circumstances and in other classes, we would pay a great deal more attention to accuracy. I don't want to downplay the need for accuracy, but in this course we put more emphasis on procedure.)

Although this is certainly not an English composition course, you should use standard English with complete and intelligible sentences. Spell check everything you submit, and if possible, have someone else read it to check for typographical errors. Give as much detail as is needed, but don't put in a lot of extraneous material. Always type or word process your material. Never turn in Handwritten work. Work turned in with odd or "cutsie" typefaces or formats, or with poor print quality will be marked off.

Larry Sessions

Now, go to: How to Submit Activities page.