Technical Writing 2011
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Technical & Professional Writing Thi s course has been desi gned to ex pl ore systemat ical ly the process of writing technical and professional documents. Types of Technical and Professional writing 1) The Report of an Investigation: Scientists present the results of their investigations in journals in the form of research papers. These are highly formal accounts of the procedure, results, conc lusi ons and impl icat ions . Thes e papers and the like ar e th e ke ystone of th e sc ie nt if ic commun ic at io ns network. Scientific report or investigation Compon ent Purpose Description Title Indicates the topic or subject of the investigation. Concise and informative; using key words relating to content. Abstract Gives a brief summary of the investigation. A short paragraph describing what was done, how it was done and what the main findings were. Introduc tion Outlines the purpose of the investigation or scope of the report. Explains why the investigation was undertaken and places it in the context of previous work. Main Body Describes how the study was conducted. Gives the results of the study. Interprets or evaluates the results. For a report of a scientific investigation, the main body would generally comprise 3 sections. The Materials and Methods section contains experimental details The Results section should detail the results of the experiments performed. A commentary leads the reader through the data (presented in an appropriate form, e.g. graphs, tables, images, diagrams). The Discussion section should contain a critical interpretation of the results and discuss them in the context of other researchers’ Copyright©Abusin 2011 Page 1 of 36