In teaching upper level science, it’s critical that we teach how to write a lab report. Some of us have the students keep journals, with dates and signatures included, just like we did back in college. Others have kids do worksheets and answer questions. Whatever is right for you, your school and your students is what is right. You should keep doing that. I’m sharing how I teach lab reporting to my chemistry students, even though we do very simple lab activities.
What my lab activities look like
After a few days of teaching a particular topic, I’ll have my students do some kind of lab activity. I usually start out by giving the kids the introduction. I want to make sure that their background knowledge is strong before asking them to handle chemicals. For me, it’s a safety thing, but also it’s there for refresher. If the kids don’t understand why they are doing the lab, it’s just more frustrating for me.
Next comes the purpose. Students usually write the purpose based on our learning target. I could simply print it for them, but I believe that having them write it solidifies how the whole lab activity works.
I also coach my students through the materials and procedure. There are a few activities where they come up with a procedure, but for safety reasons, I usually do it. I do a dry run to remind them of the name of the pieces of equipment and how to safely handle the chemicals. Then they get to work recording data on tables I’ve provided for them on their worksheets.
Quizzing My Student Throughout the Lab Activity
This is when I circle the room and make sure everyone is behaving safely, and I help to fill knowledge gaps and ask questions. I like to “quiz” the kids to make sure they know what they’re doing and why.
Most of my activities have students writing only conclusions. I rarely ask them questions about the lab activity. I force the students to write 8 sentence conclusions and it drives them crazy. They hate me for it. Too bad. It’s good for them. They are being forced to write, and think scientifically. They need to analyze their data and explain their results. It’s such a good brain exercise, I refuse to give it up.
In my lab rubric there are prompts with sentence starters. This sets the students on the right track to write a really solid lab conclusion. I have them restate the purpose of the lab activity, and give a brief overview of the procedure. This is usually two to three sentences so far. Next they report their data. They then need to determine if the results are valid or invalid. NY slang really kills this one. Valid here, means “cool” or “legit.” Like, “you valid?” really means, “are you okay?” When I ask a kid if their results are “valid” some of them simply don’t get it. I’ll be replacing this with “reliable.” (Reason number 1482 why you need to keep up with the words “kids these days” use.)
Growth Mindset and Lab Reporting
They then need to explain WHY their results are valid or invalid. This is where the chemistry knowledge comes in. I preach “chem-is-try” every single day. I let them know that most of science is mostly explaining why we are wrong. We write a lab report mostly to tell people “don’t do it this way, try something else.” This actually gives my students a lot of confidence. To finish off, I ask them to connect these concepts to real life, and ask any remaining questions.
Writing conclusion paragraphs in this way can turn a really simple lab into something much more rigorous. Even when my students are making slime or making ice cream
The Value of Writing Lab Reports
I teach 10th grade and it is the first year that students are really asked to write a lab report in my area. I’m probably tougher than most teachers on this one. I think that there is so much value to the conclusion section that it’s worth the struggle and frustration of listening to a bunch of fifteen year olds complain. I believe that asking them to write is not only good for their brains, but good for their educational hindsight.
When my students go to college, science major or not, they are more than likely going to have to take a lab science course. Once they get there and realize that they are mostly prepared for the lab portion, they’ll look back and realize it wasn’t all for nothing. It was a learning experience outside of science. It was to grow scientific literacy, increase skepticism and get the kids to ask questions. I don’t want them to grow up and simply believe everything they read or are told. They should be learning how to analyze numbers and information, and how to question results. They may be angry with me now, but I’m sure at some point they’ll be thanking me for the push.
Additional Resources
If you need labs to actually get your students to write high quality conclusion paragraphs check out my full year chemistry lab book for sale here.
If you just need the lab rubric to work with things you already have, sign up here to have it emailed to you.
Or if you want to read more in depth about specific labs I do in my classroom, check out this post on 15 “chemical free” chemistry labs.
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