Lesson 9: Writing Technical Reports (Survey, Scientific, and Field Reports) | EAPP

0:00 [Music] good day everyone welcome back to english for academic and professional purposes for our ninth lesson and final lesson for this semester we will be discussing and talking about how to write a survey scientific and field reports for today's lesson of course we have to define what a survey report is a scientific report and field report we'll also be covering its general structure and as well as the

0:46 guidelines in writing these kinds of reports technical reports are usually defined as academic papers that present and analyze the results or findings of a specific or a particular research now there are three different kinds of technical reports that we can use the first one is a survey report second is a scientific report and the third one is a field report let us now differentiate what makes this three different kinds of technical reports different from one another let's go to a survey report a survey report is simply a type of academic paper wherein you simply

1:33 collect data using a survey questionnaire and then you present the findings from this survey questionnaire based on the research that you have conducted so you collect the information using a survey questionnaire you ask your respondents you ask your study participants to fill this up or answer the survey questionnaire and from that from their answers you summarize their answers and present your findings more often than not before of course you could even write a survey report you need to formulate a survey questionnaire now how do we write survey questions there are several here are some several tips

2:18 on how you can write survey questions first one whenever you write survey questions write your questions in a simple and direct to the point manner do not make your sentences too complicated too long because you have to expect that your readers or your study participants your intended respondents would not have a lot of time to go through everything in your survey questionnaire second whenever you are presenting ranking options try to limit the number um probably one to five one to five is enough don't go over five because it might be

3:04 too much for your respondents or your intended study participants to process third whenever you ask a multiple choice question that can only have one answer give the respondents a list that covers all the options without overlapping meaning make sure that your choices your options are very different from one another they could be related but you know there is a distinction among them so that your respondents will not have difficulties identifying their preferred answer or their preferred option it is also best that when you are writing survey questions in the form of multiple choice

3:50 you avoid offering too many or too few options to them so by default we we have three to four options for our multiple choice questions survey questionnaires also always offer an out for questions that don't apply meaning you need to make sure that there is an option for your respondents for your study participants do not answer or maybe when the question does not apply to them you provide them an option that it's not applicable here's a general structural content of a survey report we have your title page or your cover page a table of contents executive summary or

4:39 abstract basically a general overview of your survey report you also need to present a background why did you even conduct the survey what is the survey all about and its objectives next is you need to present your methodology how did you formulate your survey questionnaire what made you decide to go into survey questionnaire or use a survey questionnaire how did you give this out to your study participants who are your study participants so you need to identify those things as well next is after implementing it after giving it out and collecting them back you need to make sure that you present your results and your findings from that particular survey

5:24 from the results of the survey what have you found out in relation to your research objectives or your research questions next is of course from that result or from those results or from those findings what could be concluded from it in relation as well to your study objective or your study questions and you can also give recommendations as researchers and then the last part is attach a copy of your survey questionnaire and maybe you can also attach a copy of some examples of their responses here is an example of how you could write your survey report the first part is your presentation of collected data

6:12 so the way that you present your collected data could be in a form of a graphic organizer like tables um graphs or charts so you do this because or you present the information like this in a visual manner because you want your readers to understand the results right away or the findings right away especially or particularly if it involves numbers such as this one and then the next part after you have presented your collected data you need to find meaning or give meaning to this collected data and discuss what is it about what is its relevance in relation to your study

6:58 questions or your study objectives the next kind of technical report is a scientific report it is a type of an academic paper that is commonly used to report experimental research now a scientific report will often include a thorough discussion of the materials used your methods of experimentation and of course the discussion of the results of your experiment here are the different parts of a scientific report the first one is your title the next one is your abstract your introduction materials and methods your results your discussion and of course the literature cited in your

7:44 scientific report last but not the least we have a field report now a field report is very different from the first two kinds of technical reports because it is a written document from data that is gathered outside the office or the laboratory because you are in the field as a researcher you go outside you go to the field of study and you describe what have you observed okay if it's a person you are describing or you are observing is it a place that you or if it is a place that you are observing or maybe an event okay so you are basically part you put yourself in the context you put

8:30 yourself in the situation where the person place or even is and try to write down try to take note of those observations more often than not field reports are taking the form of notes that are written or taken down during that observation but it could also include any form of data gathering aside from note taking here are some other techniques in data gathering you also could use video and audio recordings as well as illustrations so aside from recording via video or via audio you can also draw or use graphic organizers

9:17 to organize or present your observations someone who is in the field physically or someone who is assigned as a field reporter there are certain things that we have to document to make your report as objective as much as possible for example you need to take note of the physical setting so describe the physical setting depending on how you are perceiving it as someone who is in the field what does it look like okay how does it feel like to be there next one some objects and material culture for example how are they eating food how are they um for example you are looking into a group

10:03 group of people how do they interact with one another using um dress chores or maybe how do they present themselves using their clothes and stuff like that those could be recorded as a material culture as well next you could also take note of the way that they use their language how did they use their language are they using certain words that are very specific to their group or to that particular place so you also need to take note of that how is their language may be different from the way that you understand it the way that you interpret it the way that you use it next of course is try to take down notes of certain events

10:48 and how do these events unfold how are these events happening so you take note of your observations as these events are happening and like what i have mentioned earlier their body movements could also be representative of something so these are some of the things that you could also um try to look into try to observe try to notice and try to take note of or document here are the parts of a field report first the second is your theoretical framework and the third is your observation your introduction basically would provide a background the rationale or the purpose behind your um study or your research

11:36 and then your theoretical framework is similar to the framework provided or discussed in your research classes your theoretical framework is simply a framework that is derived from certain assumptions certain theories certain concepts that have already been used or have already been established in that particular field of study so um you are trying to ground your study your observation on this particular um framework last but not the least of course are your observations now these are the ones that you have documented using note taking using video and audio visual recordings

12:23 as well as your illustrations there are certain guidelines as well in writing reports i know that these three are different but i decided to just make one guideline for writing these kinds of reports because they are all technical in nature anyway so the first one is deciding on the terms of reference and the purpose of your report how are you going to refer to your report is it going to be a survey report is it going to be a field report or is it going to be an experimental or a scientific report so try to identify what kind of report you are writing or what kind of report is necessary or needed okay or x or is expected from you and then of

13:09 course what is the purpose of writing it in the first place how is it related to the study that you are conducting so you can ask yours yourself some questions such as what is it about what exactly is needed why is it needed when do i need to do it who is it even for or who is it aimed at next is deciding on the procedure or the methodology how are you going to conduct your collection of data in order for you to be able to write that record okay so try to decide on the procedure and here are some questions that you can try to answer for example what information do you need do you need to do any background reading what articles or documents do you need

13:56 do you need to contact the library for assistance or any other people do you need to conduct interviews or is it okay to be observing them do you need to record the data how will you go about this okay so that is how you will decide or go about your methodology next one is of course finding the information that you need remember that the information must always be relevant and appropriate especially if you wanted to support your document or you wanted to support your own study if you are unsure about it it is always best to consult an expert or even a professional on your field of interest or your topic next after you have collected the data

14:42 after you have collected the information try to decide on the structure that you are going to use what type of report is it and try to go back to the different formats that are required for each kind of technical report how formal should it be and how long should it be another thing that you have to consider or you have to do is you draft your first part of your report okay so it's necessary that before you even submit it try to draft what is to be included in your report write down the headings first and you may fill these in with the information you have gathered so far so maybe you can try to try to identify already what are the

15:30 different parts or what should be the different parts of your report what should be included in your report and as you go along with your data gathering or data collection you can just fill these out after doing so analyze the findings and draw conclusions from it you can ask yourself questions such as what have you found what significant or important about these findings and what do these findings suggest maybe in order for you to do so you can always relate it back to the field of study or topic next is making recommendations after doing it you have to make recommendations so try to reread your findings and conclusions

16:15 think about what you want the person who asked for the report should do or not do and what action should be carried upon after reading this report okay so take for example in a school a teacher made a survey report now how is it served how is this survey report gonna help her out as a teacher how is it gonna help out other teachers how is it gonna help out schools okay are there certain changes that need to be done so you need to make recommendations for that as well now always make sure that your recommendations are practical it's something that is visible and something that is logical okay something that other people can do if you can do it

17:02 that doesn't necessarily mean that other people can do it so you need to consider it when you are making your recommendations next is making sure that enough detail is provided for the readers in order for them to know what needs to be done and who should be doing it in the first place so as a researcher as a writer of a technical report you also need to be very specific on who would be benefiting from your report next you can now draft the executive summary and the table of contents so basically you are now trying to organize all the information that needs to be presented in your report after which compile a reference list and make sure that you include this

17:48 reference list at the end of your report once done you can always go back to it double check run a grammar check run verifications and revise your draft report as needed here are my sources and references thank you for joining me