Lab notebooks must be a notebook used only for this lab and must be written in pen. All pages must remain secured in the notebook for the duration of the semester. Lab notebooks will be checked periodically during lab periods to make sure all experiments and writeups are affixed in a single notebook – failure to do so will result in points deductions.

Overview

Lab Notebook Structure

1. Prelab (submitted to Canvas before each lab period)
2. Experimental notes: data, measurements, and observations
3. Postlab: calculations, results, and conclusions

Sections 2 and 3 constitute your Lab Report and are submitted together to Canvas.

If you make a mistake in your lab notebook or would like to make an edit, you must draw a single line through the mistake, initial next to it, and continue writing.

Prelab

1. Title of the experiment
2. Stated purpose of the experiment
3. 1-2 sentence hypothesis for the experiment
4. A table of all chemicals that will be used and/or produced in the experiment. This should include the name of the chemical, molar mass, state of matter in which it will be supplied to you, physical properties, and hazards found in an SDS. We will cover how to find this information during the first week of the semester
5. A procedure written as a series of steps (not in paragraph form). This should be written in a way that you would be able to complete the lab by only looking at what you wrote in your lab notebook. (think of this like a recipe in a cookbook!)
6. Any chemical reactions that will occur during the experiment
7. Any equations that you will need to use during lab or afterwards in your data analysis

Postlab

• Calculations
• Results
• Conclusions

The results that must be reported for each experiment will be laid out within the provided experimental lab document.

This section must include any calculations you use to reach your results, your results, a conclusion (~1 paragraph), and discussion of 3 possible sources of error. If you know a mistake was made in lab, that would be a good source of error to include.

An important note on calculations: you must include the equation you will use and the calculation using your values. If a calculation is repeated multiple times, you are only required to include one instance of the calculation as a “sample” calculation; however, you must include all final calculated values.

All of this information should remain in your physical lab notebook at all times. This section will be turned in as a photo upload to Canvas as a part of your lab report. This will be due by the start of the lab period after the lab has been completed