Communication in Science

Code:

DPI1002

Acronym:

DPI1002

Keywords
Classification	Keyword
OFICIAL	Personal and Communicational Development

Instance: 2021/2022 - 1S

Active?	Yes
Web Page:	https://moodle.up.pt/course/view.php?id=4173
Responsible unit:	Department of Physics and Astronomy
Course/CS Responsible:	Bachelor in Physics

Cycles of Study/Courses

Acronym	No. of Students	Study Plan	Curricular Years	Credits UCN	Credits ECTS	Contact hours	Total Time
L:F	75	Official Study Plan	1	-	3	30	81

Teaching language

Portuguese and english

Objectives

The course promotes the development of personal skills in Communication in Science, through the preparation of reports and scientific papers and the preparation and presentation of oral or poster communications.

The objectives are:

• emphasize the importance of an effective communication;
• develop skills in the use of bibliographic research tools, text editing, graphics composition, data analysis, error analysis and other elements to support communication;
• develop skills to summarize a short communication and meet submission and peer-review deadlines;
• develop skills to produce a communication from a paper and present it orally or on poster;
• develop active learning skills in a cooperative environment and group work skills.

Learning outcomes and competences

The acquired skills will be immediately used in courses of the program and in the students' professional future. Particularly:

• techniques for improving oral and public speaking body language;
• techniques and resources for improving written expression;
• use of bibliographic research tools, text editing, graphic composition and other elements to support communication;
• graphical and tabular representation of experimental data;
• present the value of a physical quantity given its uncertainty;
• ability to summarize the communication of a paper in a short abstract;
• organization and production of a mini-paper, oral communications and multimedia support material;
• strict compliance with submission deadlines;
• be able to work in groups in a cooperative way.

Working method

B-learning

Pre-requirements (prior knowledge) and co-requirements (common knowledge)

Program

1. Communication in science

• phases of the scientific process


• the circulation of information in science (notebook, data, essay, conference, proceedings, paper/patent, etc.)


• the structure of scientific documents: report, paper, thesis


• techniques and resources for improving written expression


• tools to support scientific writing


• scientific text editing


• search and management of bibliographic references


• creation of a mini-paper/essay

2. Elements to support communication in science 

• schema production and its importance


• error analysis
  
  
  
  • experimental errors and uncertainty
  
  
  • error propagation
  
  
  • experimental data statistics
  
  
  • significant digits
  
  
  
  


• presentation of data in a table
  
  
  
  • general rules for building tables
  
  
  • table construction tools
  
  
  
  


• graphical presentation of data
  
  
  
  • general rules for building graphics
  
  
  • graphics building tools
  
  
  
  


• experimental data processing
  
  
  
  • experimental data processing methods
  
  
  • experimental data processing tools
  
  
  
  

3. Oral scientific communication/poster 

• oral presentation

• analysis of types of oral presentations, audiences and personal style of speakers with emphasis on objectives, language, structure and means


• preparation techniques and presentation structure


• exposure techniques


• projection of complementary information image/video (tools, Powerpoint do’s and don’ts,...)


• techniques for improving oral and public speaking body language




• poster presentation




• general rules for building a poster presentation


• tools for building a poster presentation

4. Other relevant documents

• memo


• curriculum vitae


• motivation letters

Mandatory literature

Berendsen Herman J. C.; A student's guide to data and error analysis.. ISBN: 9780521134927
Garr Reynolds; Top Ten Slide tips, 2016 (http://www.garrreynolds.com/preso-tips/design/)
Estrela Edite; Saber escrever, saber falar. ISBN: 972-20-2534-1
Sarah Jacobsson Purewal (PC World); The world's worst PowerPoint presentations , 2016 (http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/slideshow/366369/world-worst-powerpoint-presentations/)
Strunk Junior William; The elements of style. ISBN: 978-0-14-311272-3
Taylor John R; An introduction to error analysis. ISBN: 0-935702-75-X (medida e tratamento de erros)
Zinsser William Knowlton; On writing well. ISBN: 9780060891541

Complementary Bibliography

Amanda Zantal-Wiener (blog.hubspot.com); How to Create the Best PowerPoint Presentations, With Examples [+ Free Powerpoint Templates], 2017 (https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/inspiring-slideshare-presentations-for-marketers-list)
BIPM; International Vocabulary of Metrology, 2012 ; (https://www.bipm.org/en/publications/guides/vim)
Lagendijk Ad; Survival guide for scientists. ISBN: 978-90-5356-512-4
TeX Users Group Website (URL: http://www.tug.org/begin.html), 2016; TeX Users Group
Tobias Oetiker; Uma não tão pequena introdução ao LaTeX2e; ou LaTeX2e em 137 minutos, 2011 (URL: ftp://ctan.tug.org/tex-archive/info/lshort/portuguese/pt-lshort.pdf)

Teaching methods and learning activities

The course is comprised of online seminar classes (TP) and, in presence and online computational laboratories hands-on classes (PL).

Seminar Classes (TP): (online)

Exhibition and collective discussion of the themes under analysis and practical examples, constantly encouraging students’ participation in the under-analysis communication examples discussion.

Hands-on classes (PL): (in presence + online)

In a computational laboratory, students have access to the tools presented in the course; specific tasks are carried out to develop the target competences for the production of scientific documents. The PLs start out of phase with the TPs so that students have a quick learning curve in the use of the text, bibliographic and graphic production tools previously presented in the TPs.

Software

LyX
Jupyter notebook
Inkscape
SciDAViS
Latex
Mendeley Desktop
Python
TexStudio
JabRef
Excel
BibTeX

Evaluation Type

Distributed evaluation without final exam

Assessment Components

designation	Weight (%)
Prova oral	30,00
Teste	10,00
Trabalho escrito	60,00
Total:	100,00

Amount of time allocated to each course unit

designation	Time (hours)
Estudo autónomo	31,00
Frequência das aulas	30,00
Trabalho escrito	20,00
Total:	81,00

Eligibility for exams

The achievement of frequency is guaranteed by the cumulative fulfillment of:

• attendance, in accordance with the "Regulamento de Avaliação do Aproveitamento dos Estudantes";
• be formally identified as an author in a scientific mini-paper submitted by a group of students, respecting the submission deadline, and in accordance with formal course requirements.

Calculation formula of final grade

Final grade for students who obtain frequency:

 

A - Mini-paper weight (as percentage): 50%

B - Peer-reviewed written exercise weight (as percentage): 10%

C – Online test (Moodle) weight (as percentage): 10%

D - Oral presentation weight (as percentage): 30%

 

Final grade = 0.50xA + 0.10xB + 0.10xC + 0.30xD

Examinations or Special Assignments

The assessment contains individual work components and group work components. The individual component assesses the learning of the proposed work tools. The work group focuses on the communication of a theme, in scientific paper and oral presentation formats.

 

1. assessment of a short mini-paper submitted by the group, where each member contribution is mandatory
2. assessment of the respective oral communication - presentation and discussion
3. assessment of the online test, carried out on Moodle, about course contents
4. peer review of a writing exercise: each student will assess 2 works by anonymous author; the individual grade will only be awarded if the student fulfills his tasks as an author and an evaluator.

 

The working groups (up to 4 students) will be formed in the first seminar class. To choose the theme of the mini-paper, a list of mini-projects and/or scientific papers will be published and open to students’s suggestions (validated by the instructors). Each theme cannot be chosen by more than 3 groups. The deadlines, either for choosing the theme or for submitting the short paper, will be announced at the beginning of the semester on Moodle platform.

Special assessment (TE, DA, ...)

It does not apply

Classification improvement

Students who wish to improve their course’s grade must enrol for the grade improvement exam at the resit exam season, and can improve their grade on:

 

• mini-paper; the improvement requires the resubmission of the mini-paper, with a deadline to be fixed in the exam period of the first semester; the improvement grade will be released at resit exam season;
• online test, to be carried out during the resit exam season.

 

The other assessment components can only be improved in the following academic year, in accordance with the paragraph b) of number 2 of article 12 of the “Regulamento de avaliação do aproveitamento dos estudantes” of FCUP, through a new course enrolment. The corresponding enrolment is performed at the beginning of the academic year and accounted for the maximum number of credits in which the student can be enrolled.

 

Observations

The jury of the course is made up of:

 

Teresa Seixas

Catarina Lobo

Pedro Teles

Pedro Viana

Tomas Silva

Carla Rosa

Outros