OBJECTIVE:

To provide and assist the students with the basic knowledge in the design and construction of traditional low-rise domestic buildings and its impact in the planning, building control, health and safety.

OUTCOMES:

1. Identify and define the purpose of design and construction details appropriate to traditional low-rise domestic buildings.

2. Appreciate the main physical functional requirements of buildings on planning, building control, and health and safety.

TASKS:

It is required that each student should write a report to the purposes of design and construction details limited to those applied locally on low-rise buildings. The topics of the coursework essay should include the following:

1) Process of Design and Construction:
Discuss related topics on:
a) Site Investigation and preparation.
b) Substructure and superstructures.

2) Performance Requirements in Oman

Discuss related topics on the following:

a) Health and safety requirements using the bylaws applied domestically and give specific examples.

b) The influenceof the choiceof materials and theselection of design features on buildingperformance.

Report Format

1) The report must be in black ink and is typed written in the English language using 12 points font in the running text of "Times New Roman ", on an A4 size standard paper.

2) The spacing of the lines must be 1.5 inches, using ‘justification' alignment for the running text, ‘center justification' for the chapter heading, and ‘left justification for the section heading/sub heading if any.

3) The font used for the chapter number and title is 18 points font; for the sections is 16 points font; and 14 points for sub sections if any, and all in bold.

4) Chapter numbers, ‘Chapter 1, Chapter 2,...' , must be in bold sentence case capitalized and placed in the middle of a new page (centered).

5) All chapter titles should be written in upper case, 18 points, bold at the middle of a new page just below the chapter number, and written in bold.

6) Subtopics written in each chapter should be numbered using Arabic numerals and indented one to three tabs as the case maybe (see sample page), and written in bold.

7) Only one side of the page should be printed and the other side should be blank.

8) The page number should be in the ‘footer' at the middle. The page numbers in the ‘Table of Contents', the ‘List of Tables', ‘List of Figures' must be in Roman numerals, (e.g. i, ii, ii,...) and all other pages must be assigned a running Arabic number (1,2,3,...) starting from 1.

9) The references must use the Harvard referencing format and arranged in the order of their appearance.

10) Every figure and table must have a figure number in an Arabic numeral (e.g. Figure 1, Figure 2, .... and Table 1, Table 2,...). The figure title is centered and identified at the bottom of figure. The table name is centered and identified at the top of the table. Appendices are not required in this report.

Report Sections

The Report should contain a minimum of 20 pages with the following sections:

- Cover Page
- Table of contents
- Introduction
- Literature review
- Main body of the report
- Conclusion
- References

The report should start from the ‘cover page' to the ‘references'with the following sections:

1. Cover Page ( refer to sample copy)

2. Table of contents: (maximum of two pages)

- ‘The title, ‘Table of Contents' must be in bold sentence case capitalizing major words of size 16 points font placed in the middle of a new page (centered)
- ‘List of Figures', ‘List of Tables', must be in bold sentence case capitalizing major words of size 18 points font placed in the middle of a new page (centered)
3. Introduction (minimum of one page)

The introduction is the overview of the report content. It summarizes the overview of the topic and how the report is organized. The following are the details of the essay writing:

1) The first paragraph is the general introduction of the topic area and the reason for choosing the topic.
2) The second paragraph is a definite statement of the relevance of the essay report.

4. Literature Review (minimum of one and half page)

Write and discuss briefly about a review on related studies on some of the work done by others in the past relevant to the essay report. It can be as follows:

- Quotations [use author's exact words starting and ending with inverted commas (‘')]
- Paraphrasing (use the author's idea in another words)
- Summarizing (use author's main points)
- Copying ( use author's figures, tables and charts)
- Personal reflections or comments on the work.

5. Main Body of the Report

The following are the details in writing of the body of the essay:

- The headings are informative and descriptive.
- Discuss the conceptual framework of the essay topic.
- Expound or elaborate the concept by presenting sub -topics relevant to the main topic.

6. Conclusion (minimum of one page)

A concluding statement regarding the subject matter of the essay will be included stating how this topic information has developed the student's knowledge and enhanced his/her experiencein writing essay and its research process.

7. References (refer to sample page)

Writing the list of all the sources of information you have consulted to be incorporated in the report is included such as the sources from websites, journals, reference books following the right format of listing them as follows:

GUIDELINES:

Follow the guidelines mentioned below in writing the essay:
- Use your own words in writing
- Use diagrams and examples to explain your topic if needed.
- The essay report should have a maximum of 20 pages

Rules & Regulations

• If any content or diagram of the report body is found to be copied from the other students then marks will be deducted from both reports.
• The purpose of the report is to experience research work so you can consult books in library, usethe internet websites, computer magazines, journals or any other source.