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How to write scientific reports

September 16, 2009 by Roy Johnson

conventions, structure, and form of reports

What are scientific reports?

Introduction

The purpose of this guidance note is to explain the criteria for assessment of English language skills in a written report.

1) It outlines the criteria of assessment
2) It summarises what a report is expected to contain
3) It comments on how you can help the reader

1. Criteria for assessment

Communicative quality: is it easy to read?
Ideas and organisation: is the information appropriate and clearly organised?
Grammar and vocabulary: is there a good range of language used so that the meaning is clear and the text is not repetitive?
Surface features: is the punctuation and spelling accurate?

2. What are scientific reports expected to contain

This section looks at the contents of the report structure, and presentation.

Structure

The structure of a report will normally consist of the following items as
a minimum:

title
authors
abstract
summary
table of contents
body of report
conclusion
references

You need to adjust these sections to suit the purpose of the report. But
each section has a particular role, as follows.

The title – tells the reader directly and at first glance what it is that you are discussing.

The abstract or summary and table of contents – gives the reader an overview of the report and a list of section headings. From these, they can see the points included and decide which ones to look at.

The body – consists of the introduction and component sections.

The introduction should state the purpose of the report and show that you are aware of its terms of reference. That is, you should say what the subject is, and what is its purpose. You should also state any method(s) used and any limitations, and finally indicate how the report is structured. It is important to justify, or say why you are writing the report. You should also give the reader a mind map of what is coming.

Sections of the report should be organised under headings. This forces you to classify information and helps you to remain relevant – in case you are likely to wander off the point.

The conclusion – starts by referring back to the purpose of the report, states the main points arising, draws conclusions, and possibly makes recommendations.

References and appendices. These list the material referred to in your work. Follow any guidelines on format for presentation of references. Appendices provide additional material not included in the text.

Layout and presentation

Layout and presentation involves matters ranging from clear title and section headings, to accurate spelling and punctuation. You must think of your reader. Presenting accurate text is equivalent to speaking clearly. Since you are not around to explain any problems to your reader, editing and checking your text is extremely important.

Judith Bell, Doing Your Research Project: A Guide for First-Time Researchers in Education and Social Science, Buckingham: Open University Press (2nd edn) 1993, pp.176. Best-selling UK guide which covers planning and record-keeping, interviewing, reviewing ‘the literature’ of your topic, designing questionnaires, interpreting evidence, and presenting the findings. Each chapter has a summary checklist and its own suggestions for further reading. There’s also a full bibliography and index.
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3. How can you help the reader?

Apart from the points raised above about structure, layout, and presentation, the main tool you have is obviously the language. There are two main points to make: the first is about what we call “signposts”, the second about style.

Signposts

Apart from section headings, you can select language which gives your reader signposts to what you are trying to explain. Signposting helps the person read the text quickly by highlighting the main points and the logic of the argument or discussion. Some examples follow.

1. The first section of your report could start with “The aim of this report…” or “The aim of this project…”

2. Within the first section, the stages could be introduced with “The first stage is…”, “The second stage…”, “This section deals with…”.

3. When you want to give an opinion or evaluate something, you might signpost with “The problem with this is…”, “What is significant about this is…”, “It is important to remember that…”

4. To show that you are drawing a conclusion, introduce the point with “This means that…”, “The result shows that…”, “It is likely that…”

Style

Style means the tone of language you use to address the reader. There are three points to make. You should avoid repetition, avoid a narrative style, and avoid vague language.

Repeat only what is necessary. That is, key words or technical terms. The reader has a memory. To flatter this, you can introduce your repeated point with words like “As mentioned earlier…”, “As discussed above…”

Although it is acceptable to use “I” or “we” in a report, too many sentences with “I” and “we” become repetitive. Avoid: “I had to…” Use: “It was necessary to…”

The reader does not wish to know about everything that happened, but rather your objective assessment of the situation. Avoid: “First we discussed…then we decided…” Use: “The first step was to discuss…It was decided…”

Be precise and be specific. Avoid: “There was a problem so we…” Use: “A problem arose with … which meant it was necessary to…”

Conclusion and recommendations

Read over what you have written and check it against the guidelines. Pay particular attention to punctuation and spelling.

With thanks to Esther Daborn

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How to write surveys

October 28, 2013 by Roy Johnson

skills for planning, designing, and writing surveys

What are surveys?

Surveys are usued to gather statistical data, first-hand evidence, or customer feedback and opinions.

Surveys are commonly used to gather information about

voting preferences during elections
government public health surveys
market research on commercial products
public opinion on controversial social changes
population surveys and census taking
data for an academic project or test

Surveys are often a form of specialist product research. They are often created by someone who has been trained in market research.

Graduates in Economics, Psychology, Sociology, Mathematics, or Business Studies are often asked to construct and evaluate the results of a survey as part of their coursework.

However, people working in other disciplines are increasingly asked to write surveys as part of their work.

Surveys – the process

If you attempt your own survey, you need to be aware of the procedure outlined here in this example.

Establish the goals of the project – What you want to learn
Determine your sample – Whom you will interview
Choose interviewing methodology – How you will interview
Create your questionnaire – What you will ask
Pre-test the questionnaire, if practical – Test the questions
Conduct interviews and enter data – Ask the questions
Analyze the data – Produce the reports

Surveys – Example

Statement of objectives

I intend to find the main reasons why Mighty Box is more popular than Pink Bucket as a gift container in the north west of England.

Rationale

The results of this survey will inform the marketing team regarding the next advertising campaign due to start 18 May 2014.

Methodology

I will carry out my research by distributing survey sheets to 5000 consumers.

I will create a database which will analyse my results in terms of a stated hierarchy of preferences and reasons.

Implementation

My consumer profile comprises women aged 25-50 in social groups C2 and D.

Location

My survey will be carried out in 17 shopping centres in the north west.

Human resources

I will employ experienced market research personnel in each of the target areas.

Costings

17 researchers @ £7 per hour x 18 hours = £ 2,142.00

Database technician @ £150 per day x 2 days = £ 300.00

Analyst @ £20per hour x 40 hours = £ 600.00

Total cost £ 3,042.00

Surveys – the two main types

There are various purposes in carrying out a survey. Here are the two main types, categorised by the types of question posed – open and closed.

Open survey
Closed survey

Open questions – What are they?

Open questions are those that allow the respondent to make up their own answer and express it in their own words.

Here are some examples of open questions.

Describe your feelings about the rail-crash.
What is your current opinion of the NHS?
How do you deal with distressed patients?

Closed questions – What are they?

Closed questions have a prescribed answer, as in multiple choice questions. Yes or no answers follow closed questions.

Here are the same topics expressed as closed questions.

Do you feel angry, sad or depressed about the rail crash?
Do you agree that the NHS is declining in quality?
Are you able to control distressed patients?

When are open questions more appropriate?

In a survey, open questions yield more authentic opinions and therefore can widen the scope of a survey. This is because the participant may express ideas that you have not thought of.
If you are genuinely attempting to find out what a group of people do think or feel, open questions are effective.

When are closed questions more appropriate?

When you are seeking to categorise a set of known symptoms, behaviour, beliefs, or feelings, closed questions are more efficient.
When you are seeking a certain response, to a given idea, then closed questions can assist your project.

Surveys – Open

Enlightenment

This is an ‘open survey’ – one for which there is no preconceived notion of result.

In other words, you need the result to be as authentic as possible, otherwise it will have no value. You have no vested interest except to know the facts. You will use these facts to inform your next sales strategy or publicity campaign.

Constructing the survey content needs extremely careful thought, planning, and trialling. An inefficient survey can cost you dear.

The open survey. To find authentic information, questions of a very different order are required. Here are some examples of open questions.

Q: I see you have bought a Mighty Box. Please state in one sentence your reason for choosing it.
A: I chose the Mighty Box because it is easy to carry and it is suitable for boys and girls.

Q: Indicate how often you read women’s magazines.
A: Never – every week – every month – every three months.

Q: Tick the content of women’s magazines in order of your preference.
A: None – articles – stories – adverts – horoscopes – readers letters

Q: With which of the following magazines are you most familiar?
A: Hers – Glamour – Lifelong – Woman’s Groan – Modern Girl – none of these.

Surveys – Closed

Publicity and politics

This is a ‘closed survey’ which seeks to gather the information which will support a belief or a statement of belief. In this case you know at the outset what result you are seeking.

For example, if you are a toothpaste company and you want to use statistics in your advertising campaign, you need to find those people who already use your product and are happy with it.

If you want to convince your management team that the main office is in need of refurbishment, you might construct a survey which will give you results to convince them. In this case, you might even include some Health and Safety issues to create a more powerful effect.

The closed survey demands ‘closed questions’. These are most likely to give you the responses you seek. Here are some examples of closed questions with their predicted answers

Q: How long have you been enjoying Mr. Stipling’s cakes?
A: Ever since they came out in 1976.

Analytical statement: ‘X number of people stated that they had enjoyed the cakes for many years’.

Q: When you relax and read Woman’s Groan, what do you like best about it?
A: I only read Woman’s Groan for the horoscopes. I don’t read the rest of it.

Analytical statement: ‘In a recent survey, over X thousand women said they found Woman’s Groan relaxing.’

Surveys – Guidelines for user-friendliness

1. Decide at the outset which of two methods you will use:

hand over the questionnaire for each subject to complete
read out the questions and fill in the results yourself

2. If you hand over the questionnaire, you need to –

Make all your questions simple and clear
Make the text large enough to be legible in the street
Make the questions answerable with a tick or one word

3. If you decide ask the questions, you need to –

phrase questions so that they sound like a spoken sentence
keep the survey out of sight of your subject, so that they actually listen rather than read over your shoulder

4. Always explain the context and the purpose of the questionnaire.

5. Avoid including the individual’s identity, or if you need it in some cases, ask permission to include it.

6. Always thank your subject for co-operating with your research.

Processing your data

7. Creating a database is the best way of dealing with survey results. This way, you can find a variety of results which will be done automatically, saving you hours of manual labour.

8. A database will also help you to generate results that you may not have anticipated at the outset.

Using the data

9. Use the data to inform your activities in as many ways as possible. The authentic survey is extremely valuable for such purposes as

correcting an ineffective publicity strategy
checking on the efficacy or usability of a product
assessing public relations in your company
using ideas generated by your employees
checking on employee morale

10. When acting on the results of your survey, publish your results as an integral part of your action statements.

11. For example, if your survey has shown that employees are not happy with the level of Health and Safety in your organisation, state that you are responding to their input into the survey.

12. If, as a result of the survey you need to make changes to your product or service, give your employees the benefit of the survey results.

Expressing the results of your survey

13. Charts, diagrams or tables are better than narrative explanation when it comes to expressing survey results.

14. A graph or bar chart showing preferences makes a bigger impact than a page of written text on the subject.

15. There are many easy-to-use electronic applications for creating graphics such as those needed to express statistics. They work in conjunction with databases.

16.A spreadsheet such as Microsoft Excel can output its data in the form of bar-charts, columns, and pie charts.

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Information History in the Modern World

February 9, 2011 by Roy Johnson

studies in data design 1750-2010

There’s a general tendency to believe that ours is pre-eminently the Age of Information. We speak of ‘information overload’, ‘data glut’, ‘digital anxiety’ and use various other metaphors of being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of knowledge, facts, and statistics at our disposal. But in fact information history has been around ever since people began making records and storing the results, even if those were marks on clay tablets. The difference is that we now have more immediate access to it, from a multiplicity of sources.

This collection of academic essays seeks to put down markers and make a contribution to a growing field of study – ‘the histories of information’. The use of the plural indicates that there is no single theory of the development of informatics, and ‘the Modern World’ in the book’s title should be taken as indicating the period from 1750 to the present. The individual studies cover an amazing range of topics and disciplines. They begin for instance with the recording of personal identity in public information systems. That is, the official data that tells you who a person actually is. The sources range from parish registers, lists of vagrants and householders, birth and marriage certificates, to the advent of ID numbers – which have still not found favour in the UK.

Many of the heroes of this pre-history were librarians, and there are sketches of the early information architects, including the seventeenth century figure of Théophraste Renaudot. Starting from an impulse to record the unemployed poor, he assembled what was an early form of labour exchange which also doubled as a pawn shop, a citizen’s advice bureau, and a publishing house for the Gazette de France – a combination of weekly newspaper and eBay.

There’s also a chapter on the design and completion of official government census and tax return forms which is (if you can believe it) almost amusing. First because of the appalling layout of the documents and the demands they made of people who might well have been illiterate and innumerate. Second because the understandable response of the recipients is to scribble illegibly, omit information, or give contradictory answers.

Other chapters include studies of the Imperial Institute (an empire of information) and the company staff magazine (information as paternalistic control). Although this young discipline is so far dominated by work done in the UK, the studies stretch themselves geographically to cover Denmark and Uganda.

The collection ends with a very theoretical examination of the notion of history itself, taking a view that in the digital age we cannot know the past because the ‘narratives’ by which we explore it in digital texts become too ephemeral. Like many other heavily theoretical arguments, this one does not bother stooping to examine any concrete examples but contents itself with a series of generalizations linked by mention of the most fashionable surnames in the genre of critical theory – from Baudrillard and Barthes to Eagleton, Derrida, and Foucault

This is something of a let-down after the fascinating studies which precede it. But like most theoretical writing of its kind, it will undoubtedly fade rapidly into oblivion, leaving the real life, hard work, concretely researched studies to speak for themselves. The study of information history might still be in its infancy (according to these authors) but with approaches as diverse as the best illustrated here it seems to be in safe hands.

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Toni Weller (ed), Information History in the Modern World, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011, pp.211, ISBN: 0230237371

Interviewing

June 30, 2009 by Roy Johnson

practical guide to interviewing techniques and skills

Interviewing is increasingly a core part of commerce, the professions, and in education, yet few people are aware of the many skills needed to be a good interviewer. This book is an resource for all those looking to improve their interviewing skills. It’s important to stress that the advice offered is for those who will be conducting the interviews, not those on the receiving end. The first part deals with different types of interviews – from people offering advice over the counter on reception desks, to telephone, TV, and job interviews.

Next comes the relationship between interviewer and respondent – how empathy and rapport can built; issues of anonymity and confidentiality; and then truthfulness in representing the purpose of the interview. Anyone who has been asked questions in the street will know how common it is for interviewers to conceal their real purpose or client. Next come the important issues of constructing questions and framing the structure of the formal interview – including feedback loops. This is followed by guidance on interpreting the responses of the person being interviewed. How do we act fairly to judge non-verbal messages for instance?

The latter part of the book deals with specific examples of different types of interview – for academic research, interviewing children, adolescents, older people and those with disabilities; then interviewing people in different cultures, and people in stressful and even antagonistic situations.

It’s written in an accessible style, and is based on a solid framework of both theory and research. Nothing is explored in any particular depth, but for those who might find themselves having to ask the questions, make employment decisions, and either extract information or select personnel, this will be a very reassuring starting point.

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Daphne M. Keats, Interviewing: a practical guide for students and professionals, Buckinghamshire: Open University Press, 2000, pp.162, ISBN: 0335206670

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iPod: The Missing Manual

July 15, 2009 by Roy Johnson

the book that should have been in the box

I bought an iPod recently for playing MP3 music files – and I was amazed to discover that it does a lot more than that. The iPod is simply an iPhone without the phone – and this means a lot more than you might imagine. It plays music, sure enough, but it’s also got a wireless card, and that means you can surf the Web, get your emails, watch videos on YouTube, check the weather or the state of your stock market investments – and all this from a device you can comfortably keep in your top pocket.

It has all these features – and yet it doesn’t come with a guidance manual. You can download a PDF from the iTunes site, but reading manuals on screen is no joke – and the chances are that you’ll miss some of the amazing features on this device which is in the process of revolutionising our connections with the online world. In the last year alone, more than 20,000 small applications (Apps) have been written for the iPod and iPhone – and these are so accessible and so cheap, they are driving down the price of software everywhere.

I like the approach of the missing manual series, because they’re written with users’ needs in mind. For instance, the first thing anyone buying an iPod probably wants to know is – how can I get music onto this thing and start listening? And that’s exactly what comes up first in the manual – how to download tracks from iTunes, how to import a CD, and how to organise the music to suit your own needs.

The main learning curve with the iPod is the nested menu system – and that’s fairly clearly explained. Basically, you’ve just got to drill down from one screen to another to find your stuff. But the manual is well illustrated with photos and screenshots, so that you know exactly what you should be looking at.

And nothing can go drastically wrong, so you don’t need to worry. It’s no wonder that these devices have become so popular so quickly. Quite apart from the ultra-cool design, you can download games, extras, and software novelties with no trouble at all. Many of them are completely free or amazingly cheap. For instance, the ‘Brushes’ graphic design program used to produce these stunning pictures costs only £2.99. At this price you can afford to give things a try – and it’s no tragedy if you decide not to bother.

The manual covers the iPod Touch, the Classic, the Shuffle, and the Nano, and it also gives you a full guide to iTunes – the site from which Apple hopes you will download most of your music files. They currently sell for around £0.79 per track – but companies such as Amazon are currently undercutting them at £0.49 per track in an effort to capture the market.

There are two other things I like about the Missing Manuals. One is that they are not slavishly uncritical. If there’s a shortcoming with the product, they’ll mention it. And two – they’ll show you how to get round the problem. There are call-out boxes packed with hints, tips, and hidden workarounds. I discovered a really useful feature for anybody using an iPod whilst on the move: you can locate the nearest free WiFi hot spot simply by finding your location on Google Maps, then doing a search on WiFi.

You can also download movies, audio books, games, podcasts, TV programmes. You can even couple up your iPod to your TV and watch videos on a full size screen. That’s why these slender hand-held computers are now regarded as something of a Killer Ap – because they have the capacity to combine all online services into one user-friendly, affordable device.

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David Pogue, iPod: The Missing Manual, Sebastopol: O’Reilly, 2010, pp.304, ISBN: 1449390471

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Mediactive

December 27, 2010 by Roy Johnson

new journalism, new publishing, new media

Mediactive is the latest stage in an argument that has been developing for some time now. In 2004 Dan Gillmor launched the notion of the ‘citizen journalist’ in his polemic We the Media. He argued that news is too important to be left entirely in the hands of professional journalists, and that bloggers (who were at that time a new phenomenon) had a corrective influence that should be encouraged. Since anyone with access to a computer and the Internet can start blogging within five minutes, it was in the power of ordinary people to create an additional and maybe an alternative voice to the established press and the broadcast media. They can also do this at virtually no cost, because the open source movement makes powerful software available to us free of charge. Since that time the sales of print newspapers have been plummeting, and bloggers have risen in importance and influence, to the extent that all major newspapers now have their own staff bloggers, having once ridiculed their very existence.

Mediactive is Gillmor’s update to these arguments, in which he urges us all to become more active, sceptical, and open consumers of information – but also active participants in its creation. And he even provides the tools to do the job. In the past you needed to own printing presses, publishing companies, and distribution networks to make even the smallest item of information available to a wider audience. But now all that has changed. Because as he argues very persuasively (referencing Clay Shirky) – the barriers to entry are virtually zero. “You don’t need anybody’s permission, and you don’t need much money either”. In other words, individual entrepreneurs now have an entirely new opportunity to make information available to the public.

His book is in three parts: first, the arguments for becoming active in the creation of media (print, blogs, video, podcasts); second, the tools for engagement and how to use them; and third, the large socio-legal issues and conflicts in online advocacy and the realms of media literacy in education.

This is an interesting book in its own right as a physical object. Mediactive exists primarily as an on-going project, a web-based set of resources, of which this printed book is only one manifestation, which might well be called Version 1.0. Other manifestations already exist as web pages, and you can download the whole thing as a PDF file free of charge at Mediactive.com. In time, as new materials, updated evidence, modifications, and corrections are made, the version number will change – just as in the case of software at the moment.

Dan Gillmor is one of those people who believe that making books available as free downloads increases the sales of a print version. It has to be said that in this form of print on demand (POD) format these books are not very attractive. They have small page margins, the first lines of paragraphs are indented, typography is crude, and perhaps worst of all, underlining is used to show where hyperlinks exist in the online version.

It has no index, footnotes, or bibliography. All of these are available in the master copy which exists on line. It’s rather like a book that has been produced by an enthusiastic amateur using a desktop publishing kit. It’s also written in bite-sized chunks for reading on screen. What works in one medium doesn’t necessarily translate well without problems for another

However this is the Brave New World of publishing and distributing ideas, and I think we might expect a few rough edges in these emerging forms, just as I’m equally confident that production standards will rise as the form matures. If you don’t believe me, have a look at any document you produced twenty years ago.

Basically he wants us all to become more vigilant and active participants in using the new media tools at our disposal. His strongest argument in support of citizen media against traditional journalism and especially broadcast media is also its smallest and simplest elements – the hyperlink and the comment. If television news reports an event, we have no way of clicking through to check the source of the information or any alternatives there might be, and we have no way of offering corrective feedback or criticism.

Having urged participation, he then goes through the best known of the new media tools – blogs, YouTube, Flickr, and even content management systems (CMS), though like me, he drew the line at Drupal as a techie step too far.

All this creates an entirely new opportunity to the individual entrepreneur in any field of interest. That’s because the barriers to entry are virtually zero. “You don’t need anybody’s permission, and you don’t need much money either.”

He poses interesting questions and raises thought-provoking questions. For instance, the apparently simple query: “What is journalism?” If somebody documents arguments over a planning application to build a new factory in their neighbourhood on a blog – is that journalism? And if not, why not? His answer would be yes – because even though you are not paid for writing the article or employed by a newspaper, the article is performing the function of journalism by making information publicly available.

He also poses an interesting notion that is reflected in the very nature of the book itself. “When is a work complete?” Why shouldn’t a digital work live on and accrue to itself all the modifications, corrections, additions, and links to further information that become available over time? There is no reason why a book should not be like a Wikipedia entry – subject to constant updating and revision.

Of course this idea leads in turn to the question “What is a book?” – to which this production is an interesting answer. Of course we are accustomed to a book being a relatively static or fixed entity, existing in maybe at the most two or three editions. But there is no reason why we should not refer in future footnotes and references to Book Title, Version 3.1.5

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Dan Gillmor, Mediactive, Lulu.com, 2010, pp.183, ISBN: 0557789427

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New Media Language

May 21, 2009 by Roy Johnson

new forms of language, rhetoric, and communication

This is a collection of papers given at a conference on ‘Language, Media, and International Communication’ at Oxford University. The contributions are from academics and journalists, and the best thing about them is that they are interestingly varied in topic and approach. Issues discussed include the manner in which the norms of communication in the English-speaking world are affecting speakers of other languages. The example given is of an assistant in MacDonald’s in Budapest who speaks Hungarian, but uses an Anglo-American ‘discourse’.

Robin Lakoff also writes on the ‘new incivility’ – how swearing and bad manners have risen to the surface of public discourse, from the television chat show to the theatres of government in the west. Sometimes the arguments seem to take a sledgehammer to crack nuts. Martin Conboy’s otherwise excellent analysis of the language of hysterical chauvinism in The Sun could have been done without evoking references to Mikhail Bakhtin.

Despite the title of the book, the emphasis is more on media than on language. John Carey looks at the problems of establishing credulity in reportage, and there’s a well-informed piece on the BBC’s anguish regarding the middlebrow nature of Radio 4.

One of the best pieces in the collection is by co-editor Diana Lewis on the changes brought about to the concept of news and the way it is broadcast as a result of now being simultaneously available in so many different forms. It comes at us in traditional manner via newspapers, radio, and television – but to these are now added instantly updated web sites, news feeds, and personal blogs – all of which can come along with a huge variety of background and contextual materials, available at the click of a hyperlink. Have a look at any page on a Wikipedia entry, and you’ll see what she means.

I also enjoyed an amusing piece from the Guardian columnist Malcolm Gluck on the difficulty of describing wines without slipping into Pseud’s Corner prose. At a more serious level, there’s an excellent piece analysing the duplicitous and rhetorical devices used in White House press briefings, where the official spokespeople try to give away as little as possible, and the press representatives try equally hard to make them admit the truth of what is going on.

There are two good chapters from professional lexicographers. John Ayto looks at the way in which newspapers create neologisms by what’s called ‘blending’ – as in motel comes from a blend of motor + hotel. John Simpson, one of the editors at the Oxford English Dictionary, considers the problem of accepting new media forms such as film, tabloids, and email as the sources for word definitions.

It certainly deals with traditional as well as new media – because there’s lots on the press, particularly the tabloids. This will be of interest to students of media, communication skills, politics, and current affairs, as well as anyone who follows trends in current language use.

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Jean Aitchison and Diana M. Lewis, New Media Language, Abingdon: Routledge, 2003, pp.209, ISBN: 0415283043

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Numbers, Tables, and Charts

May 24, 2009 by Roy Johnson

practical guidance on the visual presentation of data

Have you ever seen a document containing numbers, tables, and charts – and been unable to understand the information being displayed. Of course you have; and the fault is not yours. The data has simply not been presented effectively. This book deals with the data presentation skills required to show numbers, tables, and graphs in documents and presentations. Many people assemble their data honestly enough when writing reports and giving presentations, but they often do so without thinking how incomprehensible it might be to the audience.

Oxford University Press have just brought out a series of beginner’s manuals on communication skills. The emphasis is on no-nonsense advice directly related to everyday life. The authors show you how to present numerical data to make its outcomes more self-evident and more easily digestible. This is done by putting figures into a logical order, adding focus to the data, and using layout to guide the reader’s eye towards what is significant.

They cover how to design tables. It’s amazing how much clearer these can be made by removing unnecessary grid lines, aligning numbers and column headings, creating clear titles and headings, and removing any ‘chart junk’.

Graphs should be uncluttered, simple, non-misleading in terms of scale and numbers, and used to illustrate a clear message.

They show how to construct graphs and bar charts so that they immediately reveal the significance of the data they contain. There are also examples of when to use pie charts, scattergrams, and pictographs (small icons)

There’s also useful writing skills advice on how to integrate numbers and statistics into the text of documents. For instance, don’t start sentences with figures or digits, and how to mix the use of words and digits to clarify meaning, as in nine 6-inch rulers and three 5-a-side football matches.

Most presentation of data is these days done using office software packages, so it’s good that they give this a mention, with tips for creating good handouts.

They finish with a case study which tracks the raw data of some school exam results from gathering to final presentation. The grades and numbers can be presented in different ways, and the head teacher must choose the best way for a meeting with the governors.

The chapters of this book are short, but almost every page is rich in hints and tips. The strength of this approach is that it avoids the encyclopedic volume of advice which in some manuals can be quite frightening. This is a book which will reassure those who need it.

The all-time star in this field is Edward Tufte, on whose work they draw substantially. I was glad to see him listed in the bibliography. This is a cheap and cheerful version of the same layout principles he promotes in his beautifully designed books.

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Sally Bigwood and Melissa Spore, Presenting Numbers, Tables, and Charts, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003, pp.144, ISBN: 0198607229

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Organising and Participating in Meetings

July 3, 2009 by Roy Johnson

how to run meetings and produce the paperwork

Oxford University Press have just brought out a series of short beginners’ guides on communication skills. The emphasis is on compact, no-nonsense advice directly related to issues of everyday life. In this case it’s organising and running meetings, creating the documents which support them, and participating in them to best effect. Judith Leigh usefully starts off Organising and Participating in Meetings with the language of meetings and the roles of key figures such as minutes secretary, chair, and observers.

She then describes how to recruit suitable people to participate in a meeting and serve on a committee, and how to arrange the practicalities of booking venues and travel arrangements so as to maximise the chances of a successful outcome. She then covers the key documentation of meetings – discussion papers, agendas, and reports. This includes the order in which items should be tabled and recorded, plus tips on dealing with documents in paper and electronic form.

There’s a chapter on participation which includes both the ‘rules’ of debate and argument, as well as advice on doing Powerpoint presentations. Then comes the most unpopular task of all – taking the minutes. You’ll be lucky if you can get anybody to volunteer for this job.

Then comes a real gem I haven’t seen in books of this kind before – how to participate in meetings conducted by telephone, email, and video conferencing. She finishes with a checklist of steps to be taken, a glossary of Latin terms and financial jargon, and some templates for meeting papers and agendas.

If you’ve never run a meeting before, this tells you everything you need to know. And it’s all presented in a clear and simple manner, with the emphasis on achieving a positive outcome. That’s a long way from some of the farcical, corrupt, and often pointless meetings which I’ve had to sit through in the world of education in the last thirty years.

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Judith Leigh, Organising and Participating in Meetings, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003, pp.144, ISBN: 019866284X

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Oxford BBC Guide to Pronunciation

July 14, 2009 by Roy Johnson

essential handbook of the English spoken word

How do you pronounce the word controversy? Is it kohn-trov-ersy, or kohn-trov-ersy? And how about schedule – do we say shed-yool, or sked-yool? Pronunciation can be something of a minefield in the UK – especially when it is also linked to class accent and language usage. The Oxford BBC Guide to Pronunciation is is an ideal source for finding out how to pronounce controversial or difficult words and foreign names. Expert guidance is given on how to pronounce 15,000+ less-than-usual terms.

Entries run from Aachen and Aalvar Alto, via Maastricht and the Mabinogion, to Zyklon B and zymurgy (which is a type of fermentation, just in case you wondered). There’s a guide to how the word should sound shown by splitting it into its stressed and unstressed parts, then by showing it written in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).

The compilers of this guide – both experts from the BBC’s pronunciation unit, have opted to give just one recommended pronunciation for each term. But if there are serious contenders as alternatives, these are listed too. And the guide to how words should be spoken is based on received pronunciation.

Yet we can no longer really call it ‘BBC English’ – and for very good reasons. The BBC has been forced to use more and more people with non-standard accents as announcers. Now it is quite common for someone with a regional accent to be reading the news (Huw Edwards for instance), or commenting on political matters (as does Newsnight reporter Paul Mason – who is from the same part of the north as me).

What do you do with those people who seek to aggrandise themselves by adopting idiosyncratic pronunciations for their own names? – that is, the Cole-in Powells and Anthony Poles of this world. Why not Cole-in Pole? The editors politely sidestep this issue by observing of the American general that “The unusual pronunciation for the first name is his own” – though no such note is made on the surname of the English novelist and toff.

It has often been rumoured that during the second world war the British government tested suspect German spies (who were claiming to be English) by inviting them to discuss people with weirdly aberrant English family names. I was amazed to find that these had even more variations than I knew:

Featherstonehaugh British family name

feth-uhr-stuhn-haw
fan-shaw
fest-uhn-haw
fee-suhn-hay
feer-stuhn-haw

A great deal of the substance here is how to pronounce foreign terms, and in fact there are special panels which deal with the pronunciation of other languages, ranging from Arabic to Welsh. The entries have been chosen to reflect themes and topics of contemporary relevance, and they include newly-researched material from the BBC’s pronunciation database.

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Oxford BBC Guide to Pronunciation, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006, pp.432, ISBN: 0192807102

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