How to Write a Lab Report

Every student remembers the struggle he faces while studying in a college or university. The experience we gain during our academic life is very important and we all know that. But usually, in everyday reality we see that academics life can get boring. Try considering this: when sitting on the lecture we are getting frustrated and very tired by constantly working with a pen and making as much notes as we can (while teaches or professor provides us with useful and necessary information) or, attending the seminars, we diligently strain our brains, trying to focus and are looking for the right decision to make. Happens to the best of us, right? On the contrary, the laboratory work is much more fascinating activity, which combines the verification of knowledge on practice and gaining the best experience on the topic previously elaborated. The good part of laboratory work is called to show your strong sides by implementing the knowledge on practice- this will definitely impress your teacher or professor. Thats why students are less likely to skip such activity! If the student thinks that he can skip one or two classes of lab work, and he does not get any penalties for it, he is very mistaken. The truth is that the practical lesson he missed needs to be attended anyway (usually later and on individual basis), otherwise the final score will not be great, or it will not correspond to the desired one. While getting a higher education in college or university, laboratory studies become an obligatory part of the engineering and technical education process. The core of the lab work (despite the discipline and subject) is writing a lab report. A lab report is more than just something you get a good grade on. Its your opportunity to show that you understand what is going on in the experiment, which is really the most important part of doing it. In addition, we believe that its actually very good practice to know how to make a lab report in a manner that the reader can understand. How to write an abstract for a lab report There are three basic parts to a lab report: pre-lab, in-lab, and post-lab. Let’s start from the beginning. The first part is PRE-LAB REPORT. It consists of: I. Introduction The very first question which arises here is how to write an introduction for a lab report? It takes about 4-5 sentences. By answering on the question of what is an abstract in a lab report?, you will give the reader an idea of what you are going to do in a short paragraph. Background sentences: state why you want to do the experiment, why is it relevant, what other kinds of similar experiments have been done in the past. Goal: In one sentence, state what you are going to do in the experiment and what you hope to find. You should also list explicitly any main chemicals with which you are dealing and any techniques you will using. II. Procedural Flowchart This part of the pre-lab should take no more than one page. A good flowchart should give a reader an immediate idea of whats need to be done in the laboratory except in a less detailed format. It is a road map of the experiment. It gives a reader a representation of the experimental procedure. Keep in mind that the flowchart should be brief and cover all the steps in a simple and easy to follow manner. You will have to do a lot of rewriting in order to simplify the procedures into a flowchart format. The second part is IN-LAB RESPONSIBILITY. It includes the following: I. Data-taking Always record data directly into your lab notebook. You need to make sure you record all of the data immediately in case you forget what you wanted to say later. Also, if you make a mistake its a good idea to keep a record if it so you (or someone else trying to do your experiment) can remember to not make the same mistake twice. II. Observations In addition to writing down all those numbers (data), you should keep an eye (nose, ear, etc.) on what is actually happening in the experiment. If you add one thing to another and it evolves a gas, gets hot or cold, changes color or odor, precipitates a solid, reacts really quickly or slowly, or anything noticeable, you should write down that observation in your lab notebook. Other things to consider including are: make and type of any machine you are using, concentrations of all the standards you used, and etc. And finally, the third part is POST-LAB REPORT. It consist of: I. Gathering Data again Re-copy your data from the in-lab section here in a neat format. This is your chance to organize it into a more readable form now that you are done with the experiment and impress your supervisor with the organizational skills you have. II. Calculations Its a good idea to write out all the formulas you use in your calculations. One more point is to be sure to include the units when you are doing a calculation, and dont drop the units halfway through the calculation. This is actually a powerful tool because if your answer has the wrong units, you must have made an error somewhere along the way. Conversely, if your answer has the correct units, you could still be wrong, but at least you are on the right track (and there is still a chance that your answer is correct too!). Yet the last but not least part of lab repost is the conclusion. How to write a conclusion for a lab report The conclusion is a summary of what you did. The reason you have a conclusion is because your lab report might be long and the reader may not remember all the important points that you stated. Also, it gives you a chance to explain anything that might have gone wrong or could be improved, as well as propose future experiments. Writing a lab report is very challenging task. Apart from conducting the experiment, writing down the results there are a lot of things to be taken care of. If you have the results provided already, or if you have some parts of a lab report you need to format in the proper way, or have some doubts on title page for a lab report and yet don’t know how to do it- ask for professional services to advise you on it.