Reflection Reports
Overview
Research teams are required to submit a reflection report every other week. The exercise is not intended to add extra work, but rather facilitate a joint team effort of learning and reflection.
Target Audience
This document should make sense to someone unconnected to AguaClara and majoring in a different field of engineering.
Expectations
A reflection report is a written document in Microsoft Word that reflects a high level of effort and professionalism expected in the engineering profession. Spelling and grammatical errors should be minimal. Your team is expected to follow the formatting guidelines dictated on this page, but utilize your best judgment when writing these reflections.
These reports should take significant effort, time and thought. We anticipate that each team member on average should spend about an hour every two weeks with writing or editing. Supporting data and/or code should be uploaded as separate documents, but the report itself should be easily understood without having to look at the supporting documents.
Formatting
The documents you submit will be word documents uploaded to the wiki. Before you upload your word document, ensure that you follow instructions on the Wiki Organization Guide. All formatting should follow Grammar Guidelines for Reports.
Each report should have a cover page including the team name, team member names, and date. You will also identify primary responsibilities/roles and who is fulfilling which role in these two weeks (i.e. data analysis, experimental operation). To help facilitate knowledge transfer and learning, these roles should rotate throughout the semester so that every person does not just have experience, but is competent with all aspects of team success.
You will also identify who contributed to writing and who contributed to editing and indicate the primary author and primary editor. These roles are also rotating, and it is expected that everyone should be primary author or editor once in a semester.
Research Formatting
Utilize a pre-formatted template when writing these reflection reports that includes the style commands needed for appropriate formatting shown in the accompanying example text. For the first report, a different format is expected. The first reflection report is an exercise for your team to understand your research and team roles throughout the semester.
We have also provided guiding questions to assist you in your writing.
Design Formatting
Utilize a pre-formatted template when writing these reflection reports that includes the style commands needed for appropriate formatting shown in the accompanying example text. For the first report, a different format is expected. The first reflection report is an exercise for your team to understand your research and team roles throughout the semester.
We have also provided guiding questions to assist you in your writing.
Stand-alone Document
The report must be a stand-alone document. Important equations must be documented and explained. Variables used in equations must also be labeled. Include visual figures of theoretical and experimental results whenever possible with accompanying explanations of how these are related to your research or design.
Submission
You must e-mail the Team Leader, Monroe, and either Research or Design Leader the name and location of your deliverables including the reflection report as well as any supporting documents/files by Friday at 5 PM. Due dates for these reports can be found on the current semester syllabus. Ensure that you store your reports in your team's folder in the gmail account you log into with a ( username and password ). Late reports will be penalized 10% each school day that they are not turned in.
Adding Files onto the Wiki
When you receive your file back with comments and a grade, make the appropriate corrections and then upload your file to the wiki.
To interface the document with the wiki utilize the AguaClaraClean macro and save the re-formatted document with an appropriate name and ensure that it is MicroSoft Word 97-03 version (.doc) and not the newest 2007 version (.docx). Navigate to the wiki page where you would like to add the document as a child page. On the drop-down menu "Edit" click "Attachments." Save your file to a secure location and then "Browse" for your file. After you have located your file, click "Attach file." Next, edit your child page and type in the code that will ensure that the file will be viewed. The code may be copied in Wiki Markup mode.