Lesson

     This lesson, which targets undergraduate engineers and scientists, presents six films that summarize how to write a technical document. This lesson is important because scientific writing differs much from the general writing that you have studied in high school and first-year composition. Put another way, a gap exists in the way that you have been taught to write and the expectations that exist on you as an engineer or scientist. This lesson tries to bridge that gap. (Total time to view films: 38 minutes)

Film 1. Writing as an Engineer or Scientist: Importance and Challenges.


Film 2. Writing as an Engineer or Scientist: Analyzing Audience, Purpose, and Occasion.


Film 3a. Writing as an Engineer or Scientist: Beginning of a Document.


Film 3b. Writing as an Engineer or Scientist: Writing in Sections. Presenting in this film is Carrie McCartney (B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, 2020).


Film 4. Writing as an Engineer or Scientist: Being Precise and Clear in Your Sentences.


Film 5. Writing as an Engineer or Scientist: Incorporating Illustrations, Equations, and Abbreviations.

Comprehension Quiz

     After viewing the five films of this lesson, you should be able to answer the following questions about scientific writing.

Importance and Challenges of Scientific Writing
  1. Why is scientific writing important?
  2. What makes scientific writing challenging?

Analyzing Audience, Purpose, and Occasion
  1. Once you have valuable content, what should be the next step in writing process of a scientific or technical document?
  2. What are the most important questions to ask about audience?
  3. How does persuasion affect a ?
  4. What does the word format mean? Is there one universal format in scientific writing (defend your answer)?

Organization of a Technical Document
  1. What makes for an effective title in scientific writing?
  2. Why do we have summaries in scientific writing?
  3. Why do we write longer scientific documents in sections?
  4. What makes for a good first sentence of a section in scientific writing? Is there only one way to write a first sentence in scientific writing--why or why not?

Language in a Technical Document
  1. At the sentence level, what are the most important goals?
  2. Should you exaggerate in scientific writing--why or why not?
  3. What did Einstein mean by the quotation, "Keep things as simple as possible, but no simpler."
  4. Should scientific writing be ambiguous--why or why not? What are three common sources of ambiguity in scientific writing?

​Incorporating Illustrations, Equations, and Abbreviations
  1. What are the four expectations that audiences of scientific documents have for the incorporation of an illustration?
  2. What is the convention for incorporating an equation into a scientific document?
  3. What is the convention for incorporating an abbreviation into a scientific document?

Instructor Lesson Plan

     One the following web page is a plan for instructors to incorporate this summary lesson into a class period within their course. Included with this plan are prework assignments, discussion questions, student activities, and a comprehension quiz. The class period accompanying this lesson is 1 hour.

References

  1. Alley, Michael, The Craft of Scientific Writing, 4th ed. (New York: Springer Verlag, 2018).
  2. Bernstein, Theodore, The Careful Writer (New York: Free Press, 1995).​​
  3. William A. Sabin, The Gregg Reference Manual: A Manual of Style, Grammar, Usage, and Formatting, 11th ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010).

Sponsors and Editors

Sponsors
     Leonhard Center, College of Engineering, Penn State
​     National Science Foundation, NSF EAGER Award  1752096

​Editors
     Michael Alley, Teaching Professor, College of Engineering, Penn State
     Mikayla Detwiler, B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, 2020, Penn State
     Alexus Eicher, B.S. in Computer Science, 2020, Penn State
     Bridget Flynn, B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, 2020, Penn State
     Carrie McCartney, B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, 2020, Penn State
     Alyssa Peretin, B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, 2020, Penn State
     Kaitlyn Pigeon, B.S. in Industrial Engineering, 2020, Penn State

Film Editors
     Richelle Weiger, College of Engineering, Penn State
     Casey Fenton, College of Engineering, Penn State
​     Elaine Gustus, College of Engineering, Penn State
​For the academic year 2019-2020, we are collecting comments, questions, criticisms, and suggestions for the films, text, and quizzes of each lesson on scientific writing. To help us understand your input, would please let us know what your discipline is and whether you are a student, professional, or faculty member?