General Guidance
Only include your IB personal code (123xxx). Do not include your name or school code. Avoid
reference to your specific school or teacher. Keep data anonymous.
This work should take about 10 hours and is worth 25% of your final grade. Your teacher can
comment on one written draft of your report. During the process your teacher can give you advice
but cannot tell you what to investigate or how to carry it out.
Report Length: 1500 – 2250 words You are more likely to score highly if you have to edit your work
down to 2250 words.
This should not include your titles, annotations on images and graphs, bibliography.
There are 3 marks for the structure and organisation of your report; how you use appropriate
terminology; and how logical, coherent and concise is your report.
Introduction: Identifying the Context
Introduce the context for the environmental issue that you are investigating. What is the
problem? Is it a local +/or global problem. Discuss the issue. In this section you should be 1
picking out parts of the syllabus which relate to the environmental issue.
Research Question: State a relevant, coherent and focused research question. 2
Explain the connections between the environmental issue (either local or global) and the 3
research question. This might include a hypothesis if it makes sense.
Planning
Method: Design a repeatable* method appropriate to the research question that allows for
the collection of sufficient relevant data. Make sure you explain the method so it is
repeatable (remember the sandwich challenge) and how you know there will be sufficient
relevant data (the rule 5×5 is useful here). For ecological studies including transects, it is
usually appropriate to have at least 3 transects.
In this section you should identify your variables and explain how they are being controlled
or considered.
Sampling Strategy: Make sure your sampling strategy is clear and justified. Why have you
chosen to collect this amount of data using your method.
Offer a considered and balanced review that includes a range of arguments, factors or hypotheses. Opinions 1
or conclusions should be presented clearly and supported by appropriate evidence.
Give a specific name, value or other brief answer without explanation or calculation. 2
Give a detailed account, including reasons or causes. 3
2 © Dr. Zoe Badcock, InThinking
www.thinkib.net/ess
Risk Assessment: How are you ensuring you and any participants are safe/anonymous? You
must include a sentence to say you have considered this even if it is not very relevant.
Ethical considerations: What are the ethical implications of your study? Again, you must
include a statement about this even if there are no major ethical issues in your investigation.
Results and Analysis
Data Presentation: Present your results in an informative and easily interpreted manner. This
should include graphical display of data and some data manipulation to enable you to
discuss the validity and reliability of your data and conclusions.
Interpretation of Data: Identify all the trends, patterns and relationships in the data. Come
to a conclusion for your research question based on this data.
Please note, it is ok to say that your data doesn’t support, or doesn’t provide enough data to
confirm a definite conclusion to your research question.
Discussion and Evaluation
Discussion: How does your conclusion relate to your environmental issue discussed in the
context?
Strengths, Weaknesses and Limitations: Identify and discuss the strengths, weakness and
limitations of your method (not your results).
Modifying the Method: Suggest ways you could modify your method to avoid the
weaknesses you have identified.
Further Areas of Research: Where would you take this research in the future?
Applications
Justify one potential application/solution to the environmental issue identified in your 4
context/introduction. This should be based on the findings of your study.
Evaluate the relevant strengths, weaknesses and limitations of this solution. 5
Bibliography
Use APA format