Writing and Presenting I

Full course description

Throughout Year 1 and 2, students will receive training to improve their written and oral communication. This training encompasses a range of writing formats and skills (e.g., from keeping lab books and records of procedures, to writing the different parts of a scientific paper), as well as presentation formats (e.g., from project proposals to presenting results). In addition, although the focus of teaching communication skills lies on scientific communication, some attention is also given to communication tailored to lay audiences. Notably, most of the training in academic communication occurs within the main content courses, through the use of written or oral assessment formats, such as writing a paper or doing a presentation, which is followed by feedback from examiners, tutors or peers. This means that there is ample attention to academic communication throughout the curriculum, to which the present course adds an extra credit in the first two years of the programme. The purpose of the extra formalized teaching in the present course is to give timely, standardized instruction and guidelines to students with respect to the different communication formats used in the curriculum. Hence, specific communication styles (e.g., a specific format of presentation or writing) will be covered at the time in the academic year where this becomes relevant for the students. For example, around the time students will need to write down a project proposal and do a project presentation for their Project in Period 3, the principles and points of attention for these written and oral forms of communication will be highlighted.

The final assessment for this course is pass or fail - and not a numerical grade between 0,0 and 10,0.