Big Stuff, Small Stuff Analysis

Through reading Big Stuff, Small Stuff, I learned that there are many key differences between an IMRaD report and the typical argument based research paper that I have written in the past. One of the first differences is the tone of an IMRaD paper, which is more formal. Another key difference is the type of research and analysis that you do for an IMRaD paper as opposed to a typical argument based research paper. I've never had to write a formal report over information that I've gathered myself, although I have had experience in drawing conclusions from polls and personal research in the past. The structure of an IMRaD report is also very different from a typical argument based paper because you are analyzing raw information and creating a source similar to what a student may have previously used to write their own argument based research paper. This different purpose in writing an IMRaD report means that a different structure is the best way to effectively communicate the ideas behind the report. The structure itself means that the writer needs to include an abstract, introduction, methodology statement, and also graphs and other assessments of data in order to thoroughly prove a point. The use of multiple ways to communicate information in one report is something that is entirely new to my experience with writing reports and in addition to the different structuring sets this assignment apart from previous work that I have done.