Exp. VII - Post-lab Complete and Submit: Formal Lab Report

Purpose

The purpose of the lab report is for you to convey the experiment's purpose, procedure, results, and discussion of findings and limitations. Your report will be graded both on your results, and your ability to communicate in writing using chemistry disciplinary writing conventions.

Report Criteria

Make sure your reports comply with the following criteria.

• Write a typed 1-page written experiment report, following the disciplinary writing conventions discussed in the report-writing module.
• Use grammatically correct and complete English sentences.
• Demonstrate adherence to disciplinary writing conventions. This includes but is not limited to: use of superscripts and subscripts to write chemical formulas and chemical equations; a tone of dispassionate objectivity; reflection upon limitations and sources of error in an experiment.
• Write the report using past tense, third-person narrative voice and passive language. For example, "the cuvette was placed in the colorimeter" is compliant with this criteria. "Place the cuvette in the colorimeter" or "I placed the cuvette in the colorimeter" are not compliant with this criteria.

Report Format

Your report should include the following clearly-labeled sections:

1. Experiment title and author name
2. Introduction: this paragraph section describes the purpose of the experiment and summarizes any reactions you performed. 
3. Procedure: Write a narrative paragraph that describes the method you employed and every measurement you made. Include names of instruments and glassware. Show equations for calculations, with units, and report your actual measurements.
4. Results: Provide a calibration curve graph showing the absorbance on the y- axis and concentration on the x-axis. Include the axis units. Add the linear best-fit trendline. Show the equation for the line and the R² correlation coefficient on the graph.  Report the concentration of your unknown copper sulfate solution, with correct significant digits.
5. Discussion: Describe sources of error that limit the accuracy and precision of the experiment.

Click the link to review the example of a full lab report: example lab report.

Note: Experiment reports bearing excessive similarity to one another will be classified as plagiarized, and neither author will receive credit for the assignment. 

Acceptable Files: Microsoft Word or Adobe pdf.