In order to move myself forward on this process I have been reading Demystifying Dissertation Writing:A Streamlined Process from Choice of Topic to Final Text by Peg Boyle Single. This is a different type of book from many of the other dissertation-writing guides out there, in that it’s goal is to present an organized process [...]
Archive for the ‘Writing’ Category
Demystifying Dissertation Writing Part 1: Chapters 1-5
Posted in Being a scholar, Dissertation, Graduate school, Organization, Reading, Tools, Writing on July 17, 2010 | 2 Comments »
Academic publishing runs on its own schedule
Posted in Being a scholar, Education policy, Rants, Research, Whining, Writing on July 4, 2010 | Comments Off
3 years ago my chair and I presented a paper at the premier conference in our field. We took the comments, modified the paper and submitted it to a journal. <crickets chirping> A year later we heard that the journal had gone through a couple of “changes” and wanted to know if we wanted our [...]
How I use OneNote for my Dissertation
Posted in Being a scholar, Dissertation, Organization, Productivity, Writing on June 20, 2010 | 1 Comment »
The question came up recently about how I am using OneNote for my dissertation note taking. Sometimes show is easier than tell. I have one OneNote notebook called Dissertation. Within it, I have 8 sections: A few things about this: The first 5 sections reflect the 5 chapters required in my dissertation: Introduction, Literature Review, [...]
What does a good literature review look like?
Posted in Being a scholar, Dissertation, Writing on June 13, 2009 | 1 Comment »
It makes sense for a dissertation writer to start with the literature review; It forces you to think about your topic holistically and understand the context of the area of study you are entering and helps to clarify your thinking about both your question and your methods. But what is it really and how is [...]
Side Note: Technology Experiment
Posted in Technology, Writing on June 7, 2009 | Comments Off
One idea I did pick up from my writing group was the idea of writing notes while reading. She wrote them in the margins, which won’t work for me because they aren’t searchable, but I understand the immediacy of picking up a pen and writing something down. However I have absolutely no intention of buying [...]
Organizing a literature review
Posted in Being a scholar, Graduate school, Organization, Writing on June 7, 2009 | 3 Comments »
With my chair’s approval, I have begun working on my literature review, and one of the first questions I came up against was how to organize all that “stuff”. The literature spans a wide variety of media; journal articles, think tank reports, books, popular media articles, etc. How do you keep all that stuff straight? [...]
New Semesters, New Deadlines
Posted in Academic life, Education policy, Organization, Productivity, Teaching, Writing on January 19, 2009 | Comments Off
Tomorrow the new semester begins, and I had today off from work so I spent some time thinking about what I needed to do and how I would get it done. Key things about this semester: Working full time at day job, who has laid off half the company in the last 3 months so [...]
Articles to support dissertation writing
Posted in Academic life, Being a scholar, Dissertation, Writing on September 28, 2008 | Comments Off
I stumbled across a couple of really good articles this week that I wanted to share. They are mostly focused on grad students and academics, although I can see others who they might apply to. The 29 steps to writing a dissertation. The first step to finishing anything is breaking it down into managable parts, [...]
Papers: Class vs Conference
Posted in Graduate school, Writing on September 21, 2008 | Comments Off
This week the difference in writing between a class paper and a conference paper was driven home to me. The hard way. I have 2 conferences coming up for which I need to write the papers. They are variations on the same theme, so the background research is all the same, which will save some [...]
When deadlines collide
Posted in Academic life, Education policy, Research, Writing on August 2, 2008 | Comments Off
I’m not dead yet (best heard in your head with a cockney accent) *grin* I have just had far too many immovable deadlines over the last few weeks, leading me to prioritize everything else over blogging. First I went to a history of ed conference in Newark that was awesome. I practically got giggly when [...]
