Category Archives: academic writing

planning a paper

Posted on November 18, 2019 by

Last week I was in Norway running a three part workshop on planning a journal article. The workshop was based around a Tiny Text abstract.   As a planner myself, I use Tiny Texts for sorting out the contribution argument … Continue reading →

Posted in academic writing, argument, contribution, journal article, planning, planning a paper, Tiny Text | Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments

peer support for you and your PhD

Posted on November 11, 2019 by

This is a guest post from Michelle Redman-MacLaren and Karen McPhail-Bell. Michelle is  based in the College of Medicine and Dentistry, James Cook University, Australia. She tweets as @shelmaclaren. Karen is a Senior User Researcher in the medical device industry, based in the … Continue reading →

Posted in academic writing, per support, PhD completion, quitting | Tagged , , , | 7 Comments

PhD – plan B

Posted on November 4, 2019 by

Before I came into higher education I had a brief stint as a civil service strategic planner. I got pretty interested in the process of scenario planning – that’s where you develop a narrative about something that could happen in … Continue reading →

Posted in academic writing, completion, PhD, Plan B, scenario planning, starting the PhD | Tagged , | 6 Comments

the revision cave

Posted on October 28, 2019 by

Well, my current book is nearly done. But I was wondering, the other day, why writing a book never gets any easier. I’ve written quite a lot of books. This one is actually the twenty fourth, although about eight of … Continue reading →

Posted in academic book, academic writing, book writing, revision, thesis revision | Tagged , , , , , | 7 Comments

when you’re older than your professors

Posted on October 21, 2019 by

This is a guest post from Dr Noelle Sterne. Noelle runs a coaching and editing practice and in 2015 published Challenges in Writing Your Dissertation: Coping With the Emotional, Interpersonal, and Spiritual Struggles.   Marlene was one of the brightest … Continue reading →

Posted in 'mature' doctoral researcher, academic writing, doctoral experience, doctoral researcher, feedback | Tagged , , , , | 12 Comments

peer reviewing your first paper

Posted on October 14, 2019 by

Patter now has over 800 posts. It’s pretty hard to find things on here, even when you know what you’re looking for. Some of the elderly posts are, I hope, still useful. I’ve decided to start an occasional ‘best of’ … Continue reading →

Posted in academic writing, feedback, journal article, peer review, refereeing, reviewing, reviews | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

writing the thesis from the middle

Posted on October 7, 2019 by

This is a guest post from Dr Milena Popova, a rogue scholar and activist. They offer one-to-one academic tuition, and tweet as @elmyra. As I hit the start of the second year of my PhD, one of my supervisors casually … Continue reading →

Posted in academic writing, IMRAD, thesis | Tagged , , , , | 15 Comments