Writing in engineering classes is very different from writing individual journals or other personal reflections. When writing an essay or a laboratory report, I have two problems, namely the vocabulary and the tone.
First, since the essay is for academic purpose, it requires a series of academic vocabulary to build up this sense. For instance, it is better to use “procedure” rather than “step” in a lab report. When I write an academic essay, sometimes I forgot to focus on the selection of vocabulary. The essay becomes informal. Though it does not affect readers to get the meaning, it shows less professionalism in engineering. To resolve this problem, I need to read more academic essays and other reading material to extend the vocabulary. At the same time, I have to apply these words consciously in writing process.
Second, it is important to notice the tone in writing an essay. Academic essay usually requires an objective tone to state the fact. In other words, emotional and personal words are discouraged in writing an academic essay. In addition, the passive voice also has a more objective sense than active voice. When I am doing my laboratory report, at a few times I use “I”, ”me”. These words are showing a strong subjective feeling to the readers. The report will be less objective and professional. To avoid this problem, I need to revise the essay or the laboratory report after finishing it, to check if these words appear in the essay.
All in all, writing a good academic essay in engineering class is not easy; it needs a lot of reading as well as frequent practice.
