Hello everyone, it takes me so long to get ready for my work. I got up late today as the night before I only had three hours sleep. I love it when you haven't had much sleep the night before and you fall into a really deep sleep! Anyway I am feeling refreshed again even though this morning was one of the mornings when I had to get a cup of tea to waken up. [takes me ages to open up my eyes and defrost!]. Anyway goal before I get something to eat is to read a chapter from another thesis to see what in am in for and how doable this really is. In the afternoon I will do what I declared I would do on Wednesday evening but didn't. I will finish the day by reading the chapter on qualitative writing and make notes from all the chapters I have read. I like Lara's idea of saying things are DONE. That's motivating to see DONE many times on your posting. Have a good day everyone.

It's been a few days since my first post, so it shows why I have been so bad at declaring my goals! Anyway I am all set to get started again. Thanks to flutter for good advise about writing early. I wish I had started writing my thesis at the beginning of my third year rather than only really beginning now, but hopefully over the next few months I will be well on the way to that zero draft. Thanks to Lara also for welcome to the forum. I can see there is a lot of inspirational people on this forum writing down their writing goals and getting through it all no matter what. Taking flutters's advise I would like to begin by working on finishing small pieces of written work in my methodology chapter. I hope to draft up some sub-sections that could eventually be used in my first draft.
I haven't had the most productive start to the week. I read a book on writing at the week-end. I love to read about writing just not so keen on doing the writing! Monday was a total loss and with being at the university yesterday only had the evening to work on my supervision preparation.I got that finished late this morning. Anyway its now 8pm and because its so late in the evening I am only going to get a transcript ready for coding by tomorrow.
Lara you are a real source of inspiration, I can't imagine getting to the stage when I have handed in my thesis. It's a real milestone and you are working well towards your goals for the viva. Best of luck over the next couple of days and will be rooting for you.

I am also looking to join an accountability thread. I am at the very early stages of writing but should have started these early stages at the beginning of this year. So I feel months behind. Yesterday was my first day taking Bolker’s advise and I wrote the sketchy outline to my methodology chapter which I aim to be my first ‘zero’ draft chapter. I am still analysing my data, again early stages and finding that difficult too. I decided to start writing as I am very nervous about coming towards the end of my 3rd year full time PhD with very little to show for it. I see other students in my department coming towards the end of their third year with their full first draft in hand. I have promised to my supervisors to have my data analysed by the end of the year but I am now thinking I need to write as well to keep me going between the tasks. I am a social sciences PhD student and next year I am not funded another issue to make me hurry up! Like Flutter I would really appreciate to join a thread and make some efforts to setting some daily goals which I have been avoiding for way to long. My goal over the next few months would be to have at least one chapter at near first draft and some results starting to take shape. I would really appreciate to join with flutter to set some daily goals and writing tasks and to joining the rest of the group on this thread.

http://www.conferencealerts.com/

Does anyone have any text books they would recommend for starting qualitative data analysis on semi-structured interviews?
I am thinking of using Miles and Huberman - 1994 2nd ed - expanded sourcebook. I understand this text could be helpful for thematic analysis which I wish to use for starting my data analysis. I really appreciate any of your suggestions.

How do you organise your endnote files? Do you keep separate endnote libraries? I am planning to have the one library for writing up the thesis. I want to number the articles to correspond to the hard copies as this might help me to be better organised, everything at the moment is all over the place! Could anyone tell me how to number your articles? Many thanks

I can't remember if someone actually already recommended this one on the forum -

http://blogs.library.auckland.ac.nz/arts/archive/2008/07/11/The-Literature-Review-A-Step-by-Step-Guide-for-Students.aspx

I haven't bought it yet, but planning to.

Silly Billy, I think it’s great to get a PhD at 24, you have your whole career ahead of you. Plus the fact that as you say there are no other distractions so you can really focus on your PhD. I started my PhD at the ripe middle age of 35! I think that there are pluses and minuses for being young when you go to start your PhD and pluses and minuses for taking the up the PhD say after the age of 30. I started my undergrad studies as a mature student in my mid twenties. Before going to the PhD I had a couple of years of experience working as an RA. I just couldn’t face more study after my MSc, I wanted time out. So, yes it is great if you can finish your PhD by 24 but even if you are older it’s still ok and you can be older and not set in your ways too much!!!

Hi Ethereal, I am thinking of using a blog to chart progress. So far just pen and paper but I think it would be better to put this online. It would be easier to see than my scrawly notes! I find it is so easy to drift and think that there is nothing to show for my time, an online blog might help with that as daily progress or where more progress is needed could be more visible.

sorry online diaries, what year are you in bellaz?

I also feel the same way, am almost half way through and think I have very little to show for this. Procrastination tips would be good. I am thinking when I can maybe to turn off the internet for a couple of hours because when I am writing up I spend the first 20 minutes checking emails then I start for about 5-10 mintues, then think of something else I can look up. TV is also a problem for me but I couldn't throw it out! I think it would be great if there was like a PhD camp where a person could go to write up. I read in a how to write your dissertation type book that in the US such places exist! Anyway, I have started to write out at the start of the day what I hope to achieve and then in the evening what I actually have done. It's a paper version at the moment but I think that doing this online might be better because you feel like you are putting this progress somewhere if that makes sense, so the online diary's here are a good idea.

Hi Jayney, best of luck. We are our own worst critique when it comes to our writing. Thanks for the blog for more good procrastination!

It is a confusing one. I defined my understanding of methodology and methods to my supervisors in a similar way as Walminskipeasucker has outlined and they seemed ok with this! I think of methodologies as for example grounded theory, discourse analysis etc. in the qualitative tradition using methods such as focus groups and interviews and experimental designs as as a methodology in the quant using standardised questionnaires as a methods. I think though a survey would be a method in the quant? I am not sure but complex statistical analysis techniques may be added in as a methodology in the quant.

Lara, I think you are great. You are here in this forum trying your best to do whatever you can do for the time you have. I know what it's like to not be able to stop crying and don't worry about that, just take the time you need to cry and then in a few days time you will be able to see things more clearly. You already have alot of advise here, to do what is important for now. I wish you the best and I am also inspired by your postings and jojo's. It's hard to find the motivation for this PhD because it's such a lonely process. Your parents are there for you no matter what, that's what is important -so keep going.

Hi pineapple. I have just recently come across this where a participant wanted me to cover the cost for their hours out of work which I guess would have included the time it would take to get to and from the venue. I think the cost would be their annual salary divided up by hours you would be asking them to participate. I am only able to pay for their travel expenses and some refreshments. You say you are running the group through organisations. Is it staff from the one organisation and if yes would you be paying for each individual persons time out of work. I see from your post that you say you would be paying the organisation. I mean the results from your research would be very interesting for the organisations? I guees you are getting some organisations that are going to participate voluntarily.