Another group that benefits from the more traditional examination format are those people who have to work irregular hours, including mothers with small children, who have short, intense periods to devote to their classes. These papers have to be more than a summary of a few readings. The student needs to demonstrate a familiarity with the literature on a subject, formulate a question that focused their study, and present their material in an intellectually compelling way. Research work, done well, is the most time consuming of the possible ways to complete a course. Generally speaking, it requires a student to spend much time in the library, to use computer-related resources, and struggle with abstract concepts and methods.
Some students confuse research writing with the preparation of a report.
Basically, a report is a quick and somewhat hasty summary of what can be easily known about a subject. In that sense, it is much more like a take home examination where the student writes one or more of the questions and then seeks to answer it. If what you want to do is prepare several reports, the best format for that is to ask that one or more of your take home questions be of that type. A project is basically doing something with the materials that one is studying in a professional situation. One of the best was a worship service, carefully annotated, that featured women hymn writers and included a sermon on the specific contributions of women s religious life to common worship.