Writing Reports and Essays: Structure, References, and Research, Study notes of Innovation

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General  advice  on  writing  a  report   Report  or  Essay   Throughout  the  design  and  innovation  modules  you  will  find  that  you  are  asked  to  write   reports,  although  you  may  also  be  asked  to  submit  other  things  besides.  However,   depending  on  your  chosen  specialism,  you  may  find  that  you  will  need  to  write  essays  rather   than  reports  for  your  specialist  subjects.  This  is  particularly  true  for  students  taking  the  Arts   specialism.  Advice  on  Essay  writing  can  be  found  on  the  OUStudy  Skills  site.   General  advice  on  writing  a  report   A  report  is  a  structured    piece  of  writing  designed  to  present  findings  or  recommendations   to  a  specific  audience.  A  good  report  has  a  clear  structure  and  is  written  in  sections,  with   subheadings.  When  writing  assignments  you  should  consider  the  different  parts  of  the   question  and  use  subheadings  that  reflect  what  you  have  been  asked  to  do.  There  are  many   possible  ways  that  an  academic  report  might  be  structured  depending  on  the  task  you  have   been  set.    A  simple  report  structure  is  summarised  in  the  table  below,  however  in  your   studies  you  may  come  across  reports  that  ask  for  any  of  the  following  sections:   • Abstract  or  executive  summary   • Introduction   • Literature  review   • Methods   • Results,  data,  findings   • Discussion   • Conclusion  and  recommendations   • Bibliography  or  reference  list,     • Appendices   Typical  report  structure   Section   Purpose   Description   Title   Briefly  describes  what  the   report  is  about.   Clear,  brief  and  relevant  to  the  content.   Introduction   Defines  the  purpose  and   scope  of  the  report.   This  gives  essential  background   information  to  enable  the  reader  to   understand  the  context  of  the  report.  It   focuses  on,  and  perhaps  defines,  any  key   words.  It  should  also  outline  how  the   report  is  organised.   Main  body,   e.g.     Presents  a  description,  and   sometimes  data,  that   The  main  body  of  a  report  should  be   divided  into  sections  under  headings  and   Discussion,     Methods,     Results,  data,   findings,     includes  all  the  relevant   information  required  to   meet  the  purpose  of  the   report.   possibly  sub-­‐headings.  Normally  you  will   need  to  devise  your  own  headings  as   appropriate  to  your  report  –  don’t  use   ‘Main  body’  as  a  heading!   Each  section  should  have  its  own  purpose   and  be  organised  around  a  key  aspect  of   the  description.     Where  appropriate,  evidence  and   examples  should  be  used  to  support  the   points  you  make.   Conclusion(s)   Summarises  in  a  few   sentences  the  main  points   made  in  the  report.   Conclusions  should  refer  back  to  the   purpose  of  the  report,  as  stated  in  the   Introduction.  No  new  information  should   be  introduced  at  this  stage.  Conclusions   are  drawn  from  what  has  gone  before.   References   References  to  any  sources   that  have  informed  your   answer   For  an  OU  TMA  your  references  should   include  reference  to  the  module  material   as  well  as  to  any  external  sources  that  you   have  used.   Appendices   Appendices  may  be  asked   for  to  support  your  answer   Appendices  should  be  referred  to  in  the   main  body  of  text,  if  they  are  not  then  it   will  not  be  clear  why  they  are  there.       Structure   It  is  important  to  make  have  a  clear  structure  to  a  report,  this  will  act  as  a  framework  for   your  answer  and  help  you  to  address  the  question.  Headings  and  subheading  are  particularly   helpful  in  a  report  as  they  act  as  signposts  for  the  reader.  When  you  are  writing  look  at   whether  the  headings  would  make  sense  if  you  took  the  content  away.  The  main  headings   you  use  will  probably  derive  from  the  question  but  the  subheadings  will  depend  on  your   approach  to  the  answer  and  not  everyone’s  will  be  the  same.   Writing  Style   General  advice  on  the  grammar  for  report  writing  is  to  use  a  formal  style  and  avoid  use  of   the  first  person,  i.e.  using  ‘I’,  ‘me’  and  ‘my’  For  example  instead  of  saying  “I  carried  out   research  using  xxx  method”  a  more  formal  way  would  be  to  say  “Research  was  carried  out   using  xxx  method”.  However,  occasionally    you  may  need  to  express  a  personal  opinion  or   report  on  an  individual  activity.  In  these  circumstances,  you  should  use  your  judgement  to   decide  what  is  appropriate,  or  follow  any  guidance  that  is  given.   Getting  ready  to  reference   Starting  points   When  you  are  faced  with  an  assignment  one  of  the  first  things  to  do  is  to  look  at  the   question  and  then  search  for  relevant  ideas  and,  if  appropriate,  examples.  For  an  OU  course   your  starting  point  is  most  likely  to  be  the  teaching  texts  and  other  media  for  a  block  of   study.  In  other  academic  settings  you  might  start  with  a  reading  list  or  recommendations   from  a  lecturer.     Key  Points   As  you  study  the  relevant  material,  look  for  key  points  that  relate  to  the  question  in  some   way.    Make  a  note  of  each  of  these  points  and  against  each  one  write  the  details  of  the   author,  date,  title,  publisher,  place  of  publication  and  page  numbers  so  that  you  can  easily   identify  where  the  ideas  come  from  when  you  are  writing  your  assignment.     External  references   Sometimes  in  assignments  you  are  asked  to  carry  out  research  of  external  sources,  for   example  to  find  up  to  date  examples,  or  to  find  alternative  perspectives.    Your  sources  might   be  books,  journal  articles,  web-­‐pages  or  other  media.  As  you  carry  out  your  research  you  will   find  it  helpful  to  note  the  key  points  and  their  sources  as  suggested  above.   Tools  to  help   The  Open  University  Library  has  links  to  a  number  of  tools  that  can  help  you  to  gather  and   manage  references  as  you  conduct  research.  Try  them  out  to  find  one  that  suits  the  way  you   work  and  think.   http://www.open.ac.uk/library/help-­‐and-­‐support/bibliographic-­‐management   Using  references  in  your  answer   Plan     When  you  have  generated  a  list  of  key  points  to  cover,  look  again  at  the  question  and   consider  the  structure  of  your  answer.  What  do  you  want  to  say?  Try  and  write  this  down   simply  at  first.  It  may  help  to  map  out  a  structure  for  your  answer  too.  In  this  structure,   identify  where  the  points  and  examples  you  have  identified  will  support  what  you  want  to   say.     Weave   As  you  write  your  answer  you  need  to  weave  the  references  into  it.  How  you  do  this  will   depend  on  the  point  you  want  to  make  and  the  way  you  develop  your  argument.  If  you  use   the  author's  name  in  the  discussion  then  you  only  need  to  put  the  date  after  the  name  (in   brackets).  If  you  refer  to  an  idea  which  is  attributable  to  an  author  without  naming  them   directly  then  put  the  author  name  and  date  in  brackets  after  that  idea.   Below  are  some  examples  of  how  references  might  be  used  within  a  text,  at  the  end  of  this   document  is  a  chart  showing  how  to  reference  different  forms  of  authorship  and  media:   Stating  an  author's  view:     "Cook  (2014),  says  that  the  innovation  frame  ....."   Discussing  a  concept  or  idea:     "Sustainability  needs  to  be  considered  at  the  level  of  product,  service  and  system   (Dewberry  2014)....."   Showing  complementary  or  opposing  points  of  view  from  different  authors  or  sources:     "Pugh's  (1998)  model  of  new  product  development  is  broadly  similar  to     that   proposed  by  Ulrich  and  Eppinger  (2000),  but  there  are  some  significant  differences,   notably...."   Putting  forward  your  own  idea  in  relation  to  other  authors:     "It  could  be  argued  that  visions  of  the  future  are  the  territory  of  politicians  and  not   designers  however,  Lotz  (2014),  shows  how  designers  act  as  interpreters  of  visons  ......"   Using  an  example     "The  case  of  LEGO  (Holden  2014)  highlights  the  need  for  a  process  of  innovation"   Illustrating  a  point   If  you  are  including  the  image  in  your  assignment  then  give  your  images  figure  numbers  with   title  and  creator  details  as  below:           Fig  1:  Bucolic  Wind  by  Georgy  Holden  (2010)   List  the  details  with  your  text  references  e.g.:   Holden,  G.  (2010),  digital  photograph,    Bucolic  wind,  downloaded  from   http://www.flickr.com/photos/georgyh/4963463885/  Accessed  20  July  2014   Reference  List   At  the  end  of  your  assignment  you  need  to  list  the  full  references  for  each  of  your  sources.   Follow  the  guidance  on  referencing  style  that  can  be  downloaded  from  the  OU  Library:   http://library.open.ac.uk/help/howto/citeref/   Check   Always  check  your  references  when  you  have  finished  your  assignment.  Do  the  in-­‐text   references  match  up  to  the  reference  list.  Have  you  ordered  your  list  alphabetically  so  that  it   is  easy  to  find  each  reference?  If  you  use  the  "Create  a  bibliography"  tool,  alphabetical  listing   will  be  done  automatically,  but  if  not  you  may  have  to  rearrange  your  list.   What  not  to  do   • Don't  use  so  many  references  that  the  text  becomes  unreadable.   • Don't  have  a  separate  reference  for  each  page  of  a  book  or  article.  Instead,  identify   a  page  range,  that  encompasses  the  ideas  that  you  want  to  reference.   • On  the  other  hand,  don't  make  your  references  so  general  it  is  hard  to  locate   sources.  Think  about  whether  your  reference  gives  the  reader  enough  information   to  find  the  text  you  are  referring  to.   • Don't  just  add  a  list  of  references  at  the  end  without  referring  to  them  in  the  text  of   your  assignment.   • Don't  bolt  references  on  at  the  end,  think  about  them  from  the  beginning  when  you   plan  your  assignment  as  they  will  help  you  to  gain  marks.