This page describes one organizational structure you can use in your reports. It is based on material from the Writing Center.
Title
Describe contents clearly and precisely, so that readers can decide whether to read the report.
Avoid wasted words such as "studies on," "an investigation of."; abbreviations; jargon and "cute" titles.
Abstract
Summarize the most important results of your report (e.g. What did you find out?). Do not include references to figures, tables, sources or information not in report. Be concise.
Introduction
Describe the problem investigated. Engage your reader. Try to answer the
questions, "What did you do?" "Why should I care?" in an interesting manner. Briefly describe your assignment question(s) and general approach to address the questions.
Approach
Address: How did you study the problem? What did you use? Quantify when possible: type of measurements, wavelengths and distance (appropriate units); times (UTC clock); temperatures (centigrade or kelvin).
Don't include details of common statistical procedures. Don't mix results with approach. When appropriate use equations to justify your approach.
Results
What did you observe? Don't simply repeat all that you did; be selective. As always, avoid extra words: "It is shown in Table 1 that X induced Y" --> "X induced Y (Table 1)."
Discussion
What do your observations mean? Summarize the most important findings. What patterns, principles, relationships do your results show? What plausible explanations are there? Did the study achieve the goal (resolve the problem, answer the question, support the hypothesis) presented in the Introduction? Give evidence for each conclusion. Discuss possible reasons for expected and unexpected findings. Don't overgeneralize. Don't ignore deviations in your data.
Figures
Your figures need to tell a story about the paper. Include figures that are relevant to the 'story' and that are referenced in the text. Make sure they are carefully labeled and that your figure captions tell the reader about the figure and what to look for in the figure.
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