Abstract
Writing well is one of the most important skills you
will tackle in college. Writing is not just an important form
of communication, but it also helps you develop, organize,
and solidify your ideas and thoughts. At the same time, writing is among the most difficult skills to learn and teach. This
difficulty is especially pronounced in science classes, where
the focus is usually on science content, not on writing.
While there are plenty of writing assignments in science
classes, there is typically little attention paid to the writing
process itself. This situation is unfortunate, as writing is central to science. Writing serves as a way to communicate scientific ideas and findings to other scientists as well as to the
public. Importantly, writing is also part of the scientific
process. The keeping of laboratory notebook, the writing of a research proposal, and the telling of a story in the form of
a research paper are all integral parts of scientific thinking.
The education of scientists, therefore, needs to consist not
only of learning content and methods, but also of mastering both the general elements of writing and the specific
aspects unique to scientific writing