The importance of being able to write well and appropriately to a scientific audience

The class has been writing their egg toss lab reports.  It is important that they write well but also write appropriately to a scientific audience.  In all writing it is important to use proper punctuation, grammar, and sentence structure.  It is also important to write succinctly and concisely and not use trite phrases.

I have never been able to write prose and poetry so I will not comment on the differences between what the students may have learned about writing in their literature, composition, and history classes and what I am teaching them about writing.  Hopefully those differences are not too great.

Examples of phrases and words I do not want to see in lab reports:  honestly, actually, grab the …, who would have thought?,  etc.

We also write lab reports in the third person, present tense, active voice, indicative mood.

For example:  The student rolls the ball.