literature reviews Archives - Enhancing Postgraduate Environments

Working with Literature

PostGrad — Fri, 24 Aug 2018 08:57:36 +0000

Literature reviews tend to be one of the toughest parts of thesis writing, and research. This is in part because the volume of reading is large at MA and PhD level, and usually involves connecting two or more bodies of literature. Keeping track of all of the reading, and being selective and strategic, is a challenge. In part, this is also because students may struggle to move from summarising and synthesising the reading, to using the reading to make an argument in relation to their own study’s focus. This Prezi provides an overview of what a postgraduate literature review should aim to be, and focused advice on how to read, and write, strategically to shape a strong, relevant contextual framework for a PhD or MA study. There is also a worksheet users can download to guide focused writing about their own contextual framework, or ‘literature review’ sections.

Developed by Sherran Clarence, Independent higher education consultant. Special thanks to Kenny Chiwarawara for the narration.

Explore these additional resources

Additional reading:

Questions for users:

For supervisors/PG support staff: Think about the literatures your students are working with: how could or should these be connected? Can you assist your students with ‘framing’ their field, through talking through the bigger picture of the research? How can you then guide them in connect their literatures together to create a context for their study, that relates to the bigger picture?
For students: Start with the worksheet; it is designed to helped you articulate for yourself what bodies of literature you are reading, why, and what the connections are (so far) between them. From here, you can hopefully then begin to write this section (if you are starting out), or revise this section if you already have a draft. The additional reading recommended above will provide further guidance and explanation.

Who might find this useful?

This material is primarily for postgraduate students, although the video and worksheet could be used in workshops run by postgraduate and/or writing support practitioners, to assist students with unpacking, articulating the structure of, and writing their literature review or contextual sections.

The post Working with Literature appeared first on Enhancing Postgraduate Environments.

Keeping a Research Journal

PostGrad — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 07:19:12 +0000

This narrated PowerPoint presentation discusses, briefly, the value of reflecting on a research process as it unfolds. This reflection is enabled through the researcher learning to chronicle, or document, the process in a journal. As with a reading journal, a research journal’s role is to provide a space for the researcher to note ideas, arguments, struggles, good and bad days, questions, connections between bodies of literature, theory and data, and so on… all captured to enable the researcher to track progress, patterns of thinking, and development of their ‘voice. Here, voice is conceptualised as the point of the research, or the main argument and claims it seeks to advance. The presentation argues that learning to keep effective research journals throughout a research journey can enhance and enable the process of developing, and expressing, a clear and confident researcher voice. It takes the user through the purpose of the journal, what they could do to make effective journal entries, and explains why keeping one of these journals is beneficial during postgraduate study.

Developed by Sherran Clarence, Independent higher education consultant.

Who might find this useful?

This material is primarily for postgraduate students, although it could be useful in workshops with students run by postgraduate and/or writing support practitioners, to encourage discussion around the value of academic journaling in postgraduate studies.

Explore these additional resources

Keeping a reading journal – internal link
How to guide on writing tools – internal link

Useful blog posts:

Questions for users:

For supervisors/PG support staff: In what ways could you incorporate journaling into your supervision or PG support sessions, to encourage students to write in these informal and reflective ways? How might journaling enhance your own writing and/or supervision practice? In what ways could this tool enhance your students’ meta-learning about writing, and research praxis?
For students: what value can you see in journaling? Consider how writing informally in a research journal could enhance your ability to critique and analyse aspects of the research you are doing, or writing you are working on. What might you be able to learn about yourself as a writer? What value could this have for you later on, should you become a supervisor or mentor to other postgraduate students?

The post Keeping a Research Journal appeared first on Enhancing Postgraduate Environments.

Keeping a Reading Journal

PostGrad — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 07:00:27 +0000

This narrated PowerPoint presentation discusses the central role of reading, especially, in postgraduate research, and tackles the issue of how to keep track of what one is reading along with how to relate that reading to one’s own research. A crucial part of a researcher’s development in postgraduate study is their ‘voice’, understood here as the ability to express their own ideas in relation to the ideas of others, and to situate and argue clearly for their own research within a field of study. The presentation argues that learning to keep an effective reading journal can enhance and enable the process of developing, and expressing, a clear and confident researcher voice in relation to the work one has to read and incorporate into one’s own writing. It takes the user through the purposes of the journal, what they will need to do to make effective journal entries, and explains why keeping one of these journals is beneficial during, and following, postgraduate study.

Developed by Sherran Clarence, Independent higher education consultant.

Who might find this useful?

This should be watched along with ‘Keeping a research journal’.

Explore these additional resources

Keeping a research journal – internal link
How to guide on writing tools – internal link

Useful blog posts:

On keeping a reading journal: (http://wp.me/p3VNfn-o)
On reading in postgraduate study:
Finding the reading you need to do (http://wp.me/p3VNfn-8r)
Reading your way into your field (http://wp.me/p3VNfn-6P)
How much reading is enough? (http://wp.me/p3VNfn-6s)
Strategic reading (http://wp.me/p3VNfn-fW)

Questions for users:

For supervisors/PG support staff: In what ways could you incorporate journaling into your supervision or PG support sessions, to encourage students to write in these informal and reflective ways? Can you create ‘reading and writing’ spaces in workshops, or formalised writing circle meetings?
For students: what value can you see in journaling? Consider how writing informally in a reading journal could enhance your ability to critique and analyse the reading you are doing, or reflect on your writing.

The post Keeping a Reading Journal appeared first on Enhancing Postgraduate Environments.