The development of Chinese undergraduate students’ competence of scientific writing in the context of an advanced organic chemistry experiment course

Abstract

This study examines scientific practices associated with scientific writing in organic chemistry in China. Although there is rapidly growing literature on the features and strategies of scientific writing, further research in this area is needed to recognize and treat scientific writing as a social endeavor to evaluate it in a more comprehensive and detailed way in order to effectively convey scientific information to readers. This study shared these important premises and attempted to investigate the development of Chinese undergraduate students’ competence of scientific writing. Twenty-two undergraduate students majoring in chemistry participated in this study. They experienced a researcher-intervened Advanced Organic Chemistry Experiment course and were asked to write scientific articles on the six course experiments. Their scientific writings were analyzed based on normativity, objectivity, and logicality. These dimensions of the development of students’ competence in scientific writing during the course were portrayed. This study suggested that student's development in scientific writing can be divided into categories, demonstrating the importance and implications of teaching “learn to write” in science.