Report Writing

Business Communications

Report
Front matter Body Back matter
Front matter
Cover page
Title
Forwarding letter
Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
List of illustrations
Abstract/summary
Body
Introduction
Findings & Analysis
Conclusion
Recommendation

Back matter
Appendix
Bibliography
Glossary
Index
Cover page


Title

One or two relevant pictures
Title page
Non-Academic Reading Habits of Students:
A Survey among Undergraduate Students in Dhaka

A report submitted to the Department of English, AIUB, in part-fulfillment
of the requirements of the final examination in Business Communication,

Summer semester 2010

Prepared & submitted by
Group: Genesis
(Section A)
Rabbi Md. Ataul
Ray Pinaki
Chowdhury Aneela
Barua Saurav

Course teacher
Dr./Mr. Ahaduzzaman Reza
Assistant Professor
Department of English

Date of submission
26 July 2010

American International University-Bangladesh (AIUB)

Forwarding letter
November 18, 2010

Shariful Hasan
Course Instructor
Business Communication
North Global University of Dhaka

Subject: Submission of our report

Dear Sir,

We take the pleasure to submit our report titled Construction, performance and/or negotiation of
Bangladeshi cultural identities and Bangla language identities of the Srilankans in Dhaka. The
report gave us the opportunity to know how Srilankans in Dhaka construct, perform and negotiate
their identities.

From a poststructuralist perspective of identity, we examined how two young Srilankans
representing 1.5 generation and second generation, and two adult Srilankans representing middle-
class and working class construct, perform and/or negotiate their identifications with Bangla
language and Bangladeshi culture. The study was based on Dhaka. Interviews and audio recorded
family conversations were the sources of data. The research shows that participants positions in
relation to Bangladeshiness and Bangla language are in are in contestations with the positions
their families, peer groups or other communities of practices ascribe to them.

We thank you for giving us the chance to do the report.

Yours sincerely

Zohora Fatema tuz Tazrin Mst. Nazia Islam Md. Atikul Miah Abu Kausar
08-10489-1 07-08937-2 07-09137-2 07-08446-2
Preface
Say what the topic of your research was.
Give a background of your research.
Comment on the data collection technique.
Do not say the result.
Preface
In this report, we explored the Bangla language identities and
Bangladeshi cultural identities of the Bangla-speaking Srilankans in
Dhaka. From a poststructuralist perspective of identity, we examined
how two young Srilankans representing 1.5 generation and second
generation, and two adult Srilankans representing middle-class and
working class construct, perform and/or negotiate their
identifications with Bangla language and Bangladeshi culture.
Research for this report took place among the Srilankans in Dhaka.
Interviews and audio recorded family conversations are the sources
of data. The research showed that participants positions in relation
to Bangladeshiness and Bangla language are in contestations with
the positions their families, peer groups or other communities of
practices ascribe to them. The research also showed that the
relationship between how they position them and how they are
positioned is not fixed or static, rather fluid and negotiable where
social class, religion and age of arrival in Dhaka play significant
roles.
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgment gives you a chance to show
your gratefulness for the people who helped you
with your report writing.
Acknowledgment is not merely a thanksgiving
letter to your course instructor.
Acknowledge the contribution of the participants
of your research.
Acknowledge the help, advice and suggestion of
your course instructor and/or other instructor(s).
Acknowledge any other help/ advice.

How to write acknowledgement

Give a heading of acknowledgement.
The heading should be in the center.
Then give at lease 4 line space and start your dissertation
acknowledgement with the following lines or similar
This thesis would not have been possible unless..
I am grateful
It is a pleasure to thank those who made this thesis possible.
I owe my deepest gratitude to.
Now narrow down the people who you want to thank. They can be
your
Supervisor
Professors
Advisors
Colleagues
Parents
Friends
Or any other who may have helped you

Acknowledgements
We are heartily thankful to our course instructor
Shawn Lee Roy, whose encouragement,
supervision and support from the preliminary to
the concluding level enabled us to develop an
understanding of the subject.
We are thankful to the research participants of
this study. We greatly appreciate their sincere
co-operation.
Lastly, we offer our regards and blessings to all
of those who supported us in any respect during
the completion of the study.
Contents
Content page is a chronological
description of the report with page
number.
List of illustrations
In this part, give a chronological list of the
charts and tables that your report contains.
Do not put your charts and tables here.
Abstract
An abstract is a concise single paragraph summary of completed
work or work in progress. In a minute or less a reader can learn
the rationale behind the study, general approach to the problem,
pertinent results, and important conclusions or new questions.
The summary should be around two hundred words or less.
Write your summary after the rest of the paper is completed. After
all, how can you summarize something that is not yet written?
Summarize the study, including the following elements in any
abstract. Try to keep the first two items to no more than one
sentence each.
Purpose of the study - hypothesis, overall question, objective
Methodology
Results, including specific data
Important conclusions or questions that follow from the experiment(s)
Abstract should be single paragraph, and concise
What you report in an abstract must be consistent with what you
reported in the paper

Abstract sample
This study explores the relationship of women and men in newspapers of
Bangladesh during natural disaster. To do this we consider the theories of
vulnerability, gender and feminist media studies and investigate gender
representation in newspapers of Bangladesh. The study adopts mixed
method research on four national dailies of Bangladesh during the cyclone
Aila attack in 2009. Both quantitative and qualitative content analysis is
adopted on 171 news, features and editorials, and 127 images collected
from 25 May to 8 June 2009. The findings show only a few reports are
written through the lens of gender and most of the news is the manifestation
of male perception. Women for the most part are silent or invisible and
voices and views of men predominate in the newspapers during disasters
both as sources and journalists. In contrast to the limited representation of
women as sources in news, a large number of women appear in images.
However, women are mostly represented in domestic setting playing
traditional gender role in compare to men who mostly are represented doing
post-disaster recovery work in public sphere. The marginalized
representation of women in newspapers as victim makes women more
vulnerable during disasters.
Introduction
Introduction should have two sections:
Introduction and methodology.
Introduction
The introduction chapter of your
research report should include:
1) A statement of the problem,
2) A brief overview of the research report
study,
3) Rationale for doing the research study,
4) Research questions,
5) A description of the various research
report chapters.

Methodology
The methodology chapter of your research
report should include:
1) Rationale for choice of method (i.e.,
qualitative, quantitative). Why have you chosen
this method?
2) Selection of participants. How have you
selected participants?
3) What happened when you collected the data?
4) Ethical considerations
5) Data analysis
Findings & Analysis

The purpose of a results section is to present and illustrate your
findings. Present your result objectively, and elaborate your
interpretation in the discussion.
The objective here is to provide an interpretation of your results and
support for all of your conclusions, using evidence from your
experiment and generally accepted knowledge, if appropriate.
The significance of findings should be clearly described.
Interpret your data in the discussion in appropriate depth. This
means that when you explain a phenomenon you must describe
mechanisms that may account for the observation. If your results
differ from your expectations, explain why that may have happened.
If your results agree, then describe the theory that the evidence
supported. It is never appropriate to simply state that the data
agreed with expectations, and let it drop at that.

Findings & Analysis

The findings and discussion chapter of
your research report should include:
1) Description of data, i.e., what you have
found. Do not include your personal
opinion here. Just report your findings.
2) Your analysis of the findings in terms of
the reviewed literatures. Here you relate
your findings with your research questions.
Conclusion
The conclusion chapter of your
research report should include:
1) A quick summary of your findings.
2) Limitations of your research
3) Future directions
Recommendation

Appendix
Survey questionnaire
Interview questions


Bibliography
How to use the APA referencing style
When quoting directly or indirectly from a source,
the source must be acknowledged in the text by
author name and year of publication.
If quoting directly, a location reference such as
the page number or paragraph number is also
required.
1. In text citation (Quotes/Paraphrasing)
a. Direct quotation
Use quotation marks and include page numbers.

Bibliography
Samovar and Porter (1997) point out that
"language involves attaching meaning to
symbols" (p.188).
Alternatively: "Language involves attaching
meaning to symbols" (Samovar & Porter, 1997,
p.188).
A quotation of 40 or more words should be
formatted as a freestanding, indented block of
text without quotation marks. Note the location of
the final full stop.


Bibliography
Weston (1948) argues that:
One of the most important phases of our special
guests was to get information that would throw
light on degeneration of the facial pattern that
occurs so often in our modern civilization. This
has its expression in the narrowing and
lengthening of the face and the development of
crooked teeth. (p. 174)
If you quote from online material and there are no
page numbers (e.g. HTML based document), use
the paragraph number (para.) instead.

Bibliography
"Prevalence rates of antenatal major and minor
depression have been estimated in community-based
studies to range from 7% to 15% of all pregnancies"
(Grote, Swartz, Geibel & Zuckoff, 2009, para. 2). b.
Indirect quotation/paraphrasing
Attaching meaning to symbols is considered to be the
origin of written language (Samovar & Porter, 1997).
N.B. Page numbers are optional when paraphrasing,
although authors are encouraged to include them,
especially when it assists the reader to locate the
reference in long pieces of text (Publication Manual, p.
171).




Bibliography
c. Citations from a secondary source
Arnett (as cited in Claiborne & Drewery, 2010) suggests
there is an emerging adult stage in the lifespan of humans,
covering young people between the ages of 18 and 25
years.
N.B. List Claiborne & Drewery in your reference list, not
Arnett.
2. References list
At the end of your assignment, you are required to provide
the full bibliographic information for each source cited in
text.
Start the list of References on a new page at the end of
your assignment - do not use footnotes (Publication
Manual, p. 37)


Bibliography
References must be listed in alphabetical order
by author.
References should use the hanging indent
format
a. Books / Reports / DVDs
Each reference should include four elements:
(1) Author/Editor/Producer (2) Date (3) Title (4
) Publication Information
e.g. King, M. (2000). Wrestling with the angel: A
life of Janet Frame. Auckland, New Zealand:
Viking.


Glossary
Index