Reflections on the Emphasis of Communication Skills in the Undergraduate Chemistry Curriculum T. C. Werner Union College, Schenectady. NY 12308
The decline over the past decade in the ability of students to communicate effectively, especially in writing, is a welldocumented phenomenon. If communication skills are to develop during the undergraduate years, studeuts must be given the opportunity to exercise these skills in a significant fraction of their courses, including some in the major. For those of us in science this means careful attention must be paid to the mechanics and style that students use in the preparation of lab reports. Not all lab courses, however, are equally suitable for providing the opportunity for students to develop communication skills. The enrollment in lower-level courses is often so large that unacceptable amounts of faculty time would he required to evaluate student writing in sufficient depth. By contrast, upper-level courses usually have small enough enrollments so that more individualized attention can he paid to student writing problems. For the past 10 years we have been placing increasing emphasis on the development of communication skills in the lab portion of our instrumental analysis course. In a typical year 20 to 24 juniors and seniors take this course. Some reflections on our experience are presented here. Ralslng Student Awareness About the Need for Adequate Communication Skills The popular phrase "no pain, no gain" applies as well to writing as i t does to physical exercise. Students are more likely to pay the price for good writing skills if they are made aware of testimony to the benefit of such skills in the real world. A good example of such testimony is a survey conducted by the ACS in which 98% of responding chemists indicated that writing and public speaking were somewhat to very important in their careers.' Students should be exposed to this or similar informatlon at the beginning of a course in which communication skills are emphasized. Dlrectlons for Lab Report Preparation
In the first lab meeting we emphasize to students as explicitly as possible that writing style and mechanics will he evaluated in determining their grade on a given lab. Since we have been using this approach for several years, the student grapevine can now be counted on t o reinforce our expectations. Furthermore, we strongly recommend that students have at their disposal a dictionary and a handbook of proper English usage. We find, incidentally, that students are more willing to accept this approach than they were five to six years ago. Apparently, students are beginning to acknowledge the gap that exists between their present writing skills and those that will be required of them after graduation. Students are asked to employ a typical journal format (Introduction, Experimental, Results, Discussion, References) in preparing their report. We provide rather specific instructions for what is to be included in each section. Students are instructed to integrate data analysis and answers to the included questions into a logically developed narrative that can be understood without reference to the handout. 140
Journal of Chemical Education
The importance of students' knowing the audience for which the" are to write cannot be overem~hasized.We ask them to wiite for an audience of their peers-who have not yet uerformed toe experiment rather than for the instructor. In this way, we hopito dissuade students from the assumption that the more knowledgeable instructor will fill in the gaps in their written logic. Lab Report Grading and Student Feedback
Ingrading written labs, no attempt ismade to separate the grade into a content and mechanics component. To do so, we believe, only serves t o perpetuate a false distinction. Such a separation is often only possible when the reader knows more about the subject than the writer. Since we are training studeuts to write for just the opposite situation, that is to communicate when they are the expert, they should be taught that content without mechanics often equals garbage for the intended reader. Therefore, the lab grade reflects our collective evaluation of the content, style, and mechanics in the report. In order for the report to have maximum impact on student writing skills there must be significant feedback to the student during the term. After the first lab has been graded but before the next one is due, we discuss in detail with each student on a one-on-one basis the grading of hisher report. In these sessions we point out spelling and grammar errors and analyze awkward writing style as well as discuss conceptual or procedural errors. Those with severe writing prohlems are counseled to seek remedial help a t the campus writing center. These review sessions also enable the instructor to offer verbal encouragement t o the student. This is important hecause even the student who is committed to developing communication skills can he needlessly hurt hy a lab report full of terse corrections. The soothing of hurt feelings in these sessions helps the student focus on the mechanical inadequacies in the writing. Besides basic writing problems, a serious shortcoming that most students have is the inability to present their data to the reader with sufficient clarity. For example, they often completely ignore their carefully prepared tables and figures when discussing their results. Here again, the lab review session is an excellent place to make this point. After being shown a few examples of this in their own reports, most students can add considerable sophistication to their data nresentation. The most effective way to develop writing skills would be to require students to rewrite inadeauate reports after the review session. This, unfortunately, is not a viable option in many lab courses because of time constraints. We have, however, done this occasionally in our quantitative analysis course, which has a relatively light lab report requirement.
' "1985 Employment Outlook," Chem. Eng. News, Oct. 22, 1984.
The Use of Oral Labs Several years ago we decided to allow students to present some of the labs in our instrumental analysis course orally. This was done in response to student estimates of the time required to prepare the written reports. We now ask each lab group, which consists of two or three students, topresent two of the four required reports using an oral format. In retrospect, these oral reports have their own unique advantages. For example, most students have a firmer grasp of the conceptual material in an oral than thev exhibit on a written report. We believe this is due to a cl&er interaction among students in preparing the oral reports. Moreover. i t is difficult to over&timatethe motivating force for learning that results from the fear of embarrassment in an oral presentation. Another advantage of theoral is that student e>rors and misconceptions can receive immediate attention. Most importantly, students get the chance to exercise oral communication skills in this type of lab format. Updating Labs Student "recycline" of previous vears' corrected renorts is always a serious problem in lab courses. This prohem is compounded if the old reports contain extensive comments for improvements or if they were rewritten to satisfy the instructor's standards. Any student using such reports would certainly he able to finesse the demand on hisher writing skills. However, the effort required by faculty to come up with fresh and foolproof experiments on a yearly basis is certainly excessive. We have alleviated this problem in two ways. First, if an experiment is to he used for several
years, we try to vary the questions that the students are asked to discuss from year to year. Second, we use modular experimenrs in u,hich each experiment is essentially a cornbination of several more or less independent procedures. By changing at least some of rhesc pncedures each year, we are able to produce exprriments thar differ significantly from year to year. As a result, students consistently indicate that there is little benefit in having access to previous years' reports. Realistic Expectations How does one evaluate, in a science course, the degree to which such emphasis on communication skills is successful? Certainly, to expert dramatic improvement in student w i t ing skills is naive and unrealistic. h e n composition courses often fail in this respect. A single course, e3pecially one for which the rnnin emphasis i.; nor rhe teaching of rommunication skills, cannot solve what is basicallv a oroblem for the whole curriculum. Yet, more modest hui nonetheless admirable goals are attainable. For example, just convincing science students that good communication skills are necessary is an important step. Moreover. students should develon some realization of the effort required to develop such skill;. In some cases, whew skill.; ure sorely larkinc. success might simply be making the student awareof the magnitude of ;he problem so that remedial help will he sought. In addition, we hope that students gain a better appreciation for how to handle data in the narrative form and to develop logical arguments. At the very least, we hope todisabuse students of the myth that writing in lab courses can be done with the suspension of good English usage.
Volume 63 Number 2
February 1986
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