Assignments

Hi, I'm starting to study biology in September and I was wondering how to write a paper or do written assignments. Is there specific formatting or things I should consider?

Reply 1

Uni of Southampton Students

Official Rep

Hi there! 😁

In my experience as someone going into their second year of Biology, you often get instruction from your lecturer/tutor for each assignment. Often you will be writing scientific reports, which mostly follow a typical paper that you can find in any scientific journal. I often use other papers as an example to follow regarding what sort of language and tone is used. For formatting regarding font, size, referencing style, etc. there will often be instructions regarding what specifically your lecturers want.

Hope this helps!
Jen (UoS student rep)

Reply 2

Coventry University Student Ambassadors

Official Rep

Original post by Anonymous

Hi, I'm starting to study biology in September and I was wondering how to write a paper or do written assignments. Is there specific formatting or things I should consider?

Hi there,
Coventry University Student Ambassador here!
I am a 2nd year biomedical science student going into my 3rd this year and have had some experience with writing lab reports for my assignments. As I am unsure of which university you have chosen to be in for your course as that might affect the grounds they may consider for assessing their students. From my experience here at coventry university we have no assessment based on exams whereas we are majorly to write courseworks and are marked on them to test our knowledge.
In the past two years I have gathered that a good lab report/ research paper must consider the following mentioned points:-

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The lab report is to be written in 4 sections Introduction, methodology, results and discussion.

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It should be written in a precise manner covering all the key points across all the sections.

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It should contain of scientific academic writing while maintaining academic integrity of the work.

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The report is to be profoundly referenced and should avoid any plagiarism throughout.

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All sections should be coherent and cohesive even though having an individualistic identity of their own.

Now I would give you a basic rundown of what to include for each section of a lab report-
Introduction-

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It should consist a relevancy to the background of the research which you can built on further.

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It should cover all the basic knowledge briefly about the subject.

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At the end aims are to be mentioned importantly

Methodology-

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Should consist a brief explanation of what methods were used, why were they used without comparing them to one another.

Results-

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Are a brief collection of what you have got from the experiment.

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They consist the showcasing of data and its explanation.

Discussion-

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Here you should relate your results to background knowledge and carry out a thorough discussion.

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The proposal of your findings are to be stated here.

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The discussion of your various methods used can also be carried forward here.

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This should also contain a conclusion in the end which you can also put separately as well.

I believe this would help you give a pretty basic outlook on what is expected to be written in a research paper.
I have tried my best to keep this as simple as I could if you any have any question please feel free to reach out regarding this.
Wishing you all the best for your future!
Kind regards,
Harleen.