Environment 202B, Winter 2003                        Earth, Air, Water: the Human Context

Notebooks (a.k.a. lab-books) are to be kept by each person and will be evaluated as an individual effort for 25% of your course grade. Keeping your book current is important to keep your thoughts and experiments progressing forward. They will be collected and graded at the end of each module (at the same time as the essays).  Grading will be based on clarity of activities and thoughts, completeness (include as much detail as you can), and organization (so we know what part we're reading). Some sample pages from last year's class will be handed out in class with this.

• The Cover or Title Page must have the following:    
  Name,     Course #,       Beginning date (and end date)
  

For each experiment, label a new section and date each page when you start write on it.  Within each experiment section should be (at least) the subsections listed below. You don't have to answer all the questions in these subsections explicitly, but it's best if the answers are at least implicit somewhere in your records (you should read this and your book over before you turn it in and if these questions are not answered, add material where necessary). You may repeat subsections as needed (maybe you discovered a new method to try, with new results) and do not be afraid to start over if necessary, just record it all. Use pages liberally; very few will be able to  fill a notebook during the quarter. 

• Introduction:
  What is the issue or question?  Why is it relevant to the environment?  What do I know about it or what can I hypothesize about it?  
  
• Methods:
  How can I address the issue/question?  What specifically will/did I do and why?
  What materials are/were needed and how are/were they used?  Diagram of the set-up?  Details.
• Results:
  What happened when I did certain things?  Was data generated?  Tables, graphs. More details.
• Conclusion:
  What do the results (of all forms) tell me about the main issue/question, or related sub-questions?
  How does this scale up (or down) to the real world?  How does explain a part of the environment?  
• Further investigation:
  What do various outside sources have to say about the issue/question?
  Attach relevant photos, graphs, articles, etc. here and be sure to cite anything you include.

Also, somewhere in each general unit of your book (Energy, Air, Water), you need to have the following sections: 

• Others’ experiments:
  Visit other lab groups' experiments  (perhaps while you're waiting to start another) and find out what it's about, how they're addressing the issue/questions and how their experiment is applicable or relevant to the real world.
• Essay development/draft notes:
  Record which topic you chose and your outlines, ideas, sources used, and anything else relevant.