MR. SYRACUSE’S LAB REPORT SUGGESTIONS 1. Put your procedure in paragraph form. 2. Title your procedures section either “methods” OR “procedures,” not both. 3. Do not use the words “next, first, then, secondly, after that” etc. 4. Give a title for all charts, graphs, figures, tables, etc, and place the title under the figure. (e.g. “figure 1. blah blah blah”) 5. Affect is a verb; effect is a noun. 6. Don’t label your title page. I know what it is. 7. You do not need to hand in the lab handout from our lab book. Just your report is fine. 8. Where: Groton High School, Groton, NY. Not the lab table by the whiteboard, etc. etc. 9. The abstract need not be on a separate sheet. Everything after the title page can go on the same page. 10. Each student must turn in his or her own report. 11. Make your conclusions rich and deep. Explain WHY things happened, propose theories, and suggest further experiments. Use outside research if you’d like to! 12. Staple your lab report. 13. Don’t put a heading on your lab report, a title page is fine. 14. You don’t need to say “this section is about conclusions.” I know that if it is labeled “conclusions,” that that is what I’m gunna get. 15. Keep decorative pictures out. If you want to use an instructional picture, you may do so. We are not, after all, scrapbooking, are we? 16. Relate your results and your conclusions to your hypothesis. Did your results disprove or confirm your hypothesis? WHY did they do so? Explain these things to me! 17. You might choose to use some killer fonts instead of the more frivolous pictures on your title page. Make sure I can read things, though. 18. Give me as much detail as you can without being pedantic. Make sure someone else could recreate your experiment! 19. Cite your sources if you do any research. 20. What is the best way to represent your data? Is it a graph, chart, etc? What kind of graph? 21. Don’t use “you” in the procedure. 22. Assume the reader can do basic calculations. 23. Don’t put roman numerals on your section titles (e.g. I. Abstract, II. Introduction, etc.) 24. Be specific in your materials section. 25. Don’t be conversational in your introduction or conclusions. You don’t need to use “So let’s find out!” or phrases like that. 26. “Conclusions” should be plural. After all, you should come to more than one! 27. Always write in the past tense. 28. Put your procedures in the passive voice to remove the “yous” from it. For example, instead of writing “you put two goldfish into a beaker,” say “two goldfish were placed in a beaker.” 29. A hypothesis is neither right nor wrong; it is an educated guess. If your results do not match your hypothesis, say that your hypothesis was not supported. If they do match, it is supported. 30. Don’t use subjective words like “better” or “nicer.” Say what you mean.