Details of the SLRP Preliminary Section A Report
The SLRP Preliminary Section A Report contributes 10% to the overall module mark. In it you should write about the literature topic you were assigned. The Preliminary Section A Report is fairly short: 800 – 1000 words including an abstract.
You must use the Word template provided on Moodle to produce your Preliminary Section A Report. You are encouraged to convert your final version into pdf format and upload this, as the formatting is more likely to be preserved. If you do upload a pdf you may be asked to provide the original Word file at a later date (but within 4 weeks of submission).
The report will have an Abstract, Main Text and Reference sections.
ABSTRACT: You must include an Abstract. The Abstract should be 80 – 150 words in length and consist of just one paragraph of text. The abstract should include an explanation of your literature review topic and a summary of your findings so far.
MAIN TEXT: Must be focused on the literature topic you were assigned – markers will know the title you were assigned. For the Preliminary report only ~900 words are required (the whole report including the abstract and any figure captions but not including the Reference list at the end must be 800 – 1000 words). In an excellent report you will have clearly defined the problem about which your literature topic is concerned and placed it in context of the wider field/subject area. This material will have been assembled into a clearly written, coherent and balanced account, which reveals your critical analysis of the information. You will have gathered and used initial appropriate evidence and material. At this stage (Preliminary Section A Report) you must show evidence of having read at least 4 research papers, these must be primary sources and not review articles (you may make reference to review articles but they will not count towards the 4 research papers). The research papers will be up-to-date and properly cited in the text and the required bibliographic details will have been listed in the reference section of the report. You may use either the numerical reference scheme used by the journal Nature (taking care to cite the first instance of any work in its correct numerical order with respect to the list of references) or the Harvard scheme used by the journal Cell. You will have drawn appropriate conclusions based on the your understanding of the evidence and evaluation of the material presented. Critical analysis of the material is essential in order to obtain a high grade. You may, and in fact are encouraged, to include relevant figures (images) to illustrate your work but these MUST be correctly cited.
REFERENCES
You must make sure this list is formatted consistently and correctly. You may use either the style and formatting used by the journal Nature or the journal Cell.
Please see the library website:
https://bbk.libguides.com/biologicalsciences/referencing
for more information about referencing in academic writing and this useful guide:
https://bbk.libguides.com/ld.php?content_id=31989971
Essential Checklist for Preliminary Section A report:
1) Use template provided
2) Only write about your assigned literature topic
3) Your whole Section A Preliminary Report must be 800 – 1000 words including everything except the Reference list at the end
4) Make sure it is all your own work, don’t copy text from other sources 5) A least 4 relevant primary research articles are cited.