The Science of Science Writing

Many students struggle with writing, and they wonder why they have to go through this. Clearly, we live in a society that value writing, and we write in one form or another almost every day. Writing has become a basic requirement in today’s technology-driven life and in the information age where most of the information is written. Writing is probably more important now than at any time in our history. All educators consider writing as the most appropriate way to assess students’ learning and predict their academic success. Therefore, students need to learn writing effectively in school to be prepared to participate in today’s civic life

One of the quotes that Kelly Gallagher has included in her text” Write Like this- Teaching Real World Writing Through Modeling and Mentor Texts” is:

Every year in the United States large numbers of adolescents graduate from high school unable to write at least at the basic levels required by colleges or employees. In addition, every school day 7,000 young people drop out of high school, many of them because they lack the basic literacy skills to meet the growing demands of the high school curriculum (Graham and Perin 2007, 3)

The fact that a large number of secondary students are unable to write effectively to meet the demands of colleges and careers has blown my mind. It makes me think of the reasons behind this, and what can I do about it as a future science teacher? As Gallagher suggested, students need to know why they should write and the purpose of writing in real life. When students know why writing is important in real life, they are more likely to put more effort to learn it effictively. 

Gallagher outlined a number of purposes for writing in the real life. The purposes are: express and reflect, inform an explain, evaluate and judge, inquire and explore, analyze and interrupt, and take a stand/propose a solution. I think teaching students these purposes would be very beneficial in science classes. As a future science teacher, I am thinking about how I could implement these purposes in my lessons. I have tried to do the real-world writing purposes chart that Gallagher provided in his text by myself on a scientific topic such as global warming as shown in the table below. I think this chart is really an effective exercise to teach writing in any science class. This exercise helped me to understand that not all writing is the same, and you can write for different purposes in one topic.

Writing lab reports and scientific papers are another type of writing that secondary students have to learn effectively. When students understand the importance and the purpose of writing scientific reports in real life, they are more likely to learn it effectively. Scientific reports include most of the real-world writing purposes that Gallagher outlined in his text, so when students write a lab report, they will be able to stretch themselves as writers into different writing discourses. A scientific report usually consists of abstract, introduction, materials and method, results, discussion, and conclusion. Each section of the lab report consists of specific purpose and specific type of information. For example, the abstract is the summary of the report. The introduction outlines the purpose of the experiment, gives background information on the subject, points out the questions that need to be answer through the experiment, and states the hypothesis – an educated guess tested through the experiment. The material and method section report all the materials and methods used in the experiments. The results section reports the data. The discussion section includes analysis and interpretation of the data, the writer also in this section makes a stand whether to accept the hypotheses or reject it. Finally, the conclusion section could include a reflection about the experiment and a proposed solution. For each section in the lab report, students learn to write for a different purpose.

Students needs to understand the importance of scientific reports as records for scientific information that future researchers and scientists could build on to expand our understanding of natural phenomena.  Students need to understand that writing scientific report is also an important skill that is required into many careers in the science field. Moreover, many professions require some form of writing reports.  For example, doctors and nurses write medical reports and accountants and business managers create financial reports.

As a future science teacher, I will provide my students with real world models of scientific reports. I will model writing a lab report in front of the students, and I will think aloud while I am writing. Students need to see the process of writing reports to understand the process. Finally, I will let students write several drafts for the report, and for each draft I will keep providing them with feedback until they hopefully learn how to write a good lab report.