I have found this very interesting reading as I came on tonight to ask teh very same question,

Thephder - I hope you don;t mind me adding in a question - I brain dump into documents, based on ares I know I need to read (e.d. landscape ecology/riperian corridors/ecosystem services) but something I do struggle with besides simply regurgitating other peopls texts is remembering wether what I have written is my original thought or wether i need to reference it and have simply forgotten the author.

I wake in a panic some nights at the thought of plagerism, and in fact I am sure I have deleted several great sentences purely because I can;t remember if I have accidently remembered them from someone elses text. Argh!

Just wanted to offer a glass of wine (virtual - doesn't taste so great but does have the advantage of no hangover) in your direction, I have an 8 month old and have just started my PhD in Feb. Its chaotic to say the least, I have taken the decision to send her to nursery 3 rather than 2 days a week after Easter, 'day' at the weekend when my husband is meant to do childcare hasn;t materialised and together with various nursery bugs, sickness and things I think I've managed four weeks since Feb where I have done two full days a week!

I should add that before I started this PhD I thought I'd be able to work when baby slept (ha bloody ha) and I had the agreement of my husband that he would have our daughter a whole day at the weekend - he occasionally manages 4 hours but its hard to then concentrate with her in the background.

I'm only at teh beginning but I have learnt to do hard concentraty stuff when its quiet and do data work when i might get interrupted. Is there any way you can create a work space with a very big sign saying DO NOT DISTURB!?

The one you have for me is a 'crop up over and over' one! The task I have been set (or set myself) is to have a good enough understanding of the various strands of my research so that I can hold a decent conversation with my supervisory team at the end of May about my proposed research, possible methodologies and software i need to learn/ethical approval etc. The last few meetings I have been going 'Um' and 'Er' a lot and frantically writing copious notes!

The damn thing will *have* to evolve, there is no way I can weigh through all this by the end of May as well as raise a child, manage a house move and arrange our first family holiday, I have set myself a few targets though which I want to try and meet. I was working within a well lit quite noisy office of PGRs but at the drop of a hat I've today been moved to a room away from my research group due to a reorganisation. I'm taking up residence in our library instead where I get staggering amounts done. Every cloud...

Gregory, S.V., Swanson, F.J., McKee,W.A., Cummins, K.W., 1991. An ecosystem per- spective of riparian zones. BioScience 41 (8), 540–551

Would like to read this but cannot get it - can anyone help? ty in advance

p.s. when do you stop with references? i.e. i read a paper, and look up say 10 ref, those ten refs each have 10 refs etc etc

Thanks Ady - I am just sitting down to work out what I can and can't get hold of. I was pretty certain I had read someone that its ok to do it at masters but at phd you should go back and read the original papers.

And there was me thinking i'd have this whole thing nailed by hometime. *joke*

Hey,
The literature is going slowly but surely, have managed to at least create a series of sections which I need to read within, and a very very draft knockabout format for the research i'd like to do. However a few areas are quite elusive and I am just trying to get to grips with including what others have written while staying firmly on the correct side of referencing and forming my opinion/research direction.

Herein lies my problem. I have found a single paper which neatly on one pages summerises exactly what I am looking for as background to a section but the author has gathered this info from a wide variety of sources I do not have access to (have spent hours trying but our uni doesn't sign up to those journals). Any tips on how I can go about including this information without looking lazy? I did wonder about a table with the information summerised within and her references, and then under my table I put "Adapted from x, 2009".

any thought muchly appreciated as always, many thanks:-)

Just thought I'd pop back and say thank you to everyone who gave me a gentle push in the right direction.

My masters presentation went really well and I was asked by several people why I hadn't written a paper then and that I should do now, so it was a great ego boost if nothing else! I got to talk to quite a lot of different people about my research and came away feeling really positive. Even if I did quiver most of the way through cos of nerves! Also hadn't appreciated how long to took me to put the presentation together, a valuable lesson learnt quite early.

I finished my demo'ing work yesterday and so will now have 2 days a week to dedicate wholly to reading and writing (and 3 a week after Easter). I set myself the challenge to write 500 words off the top of my head about my research yesterday afternoon and I did nearer 1000, which when I read it back this morning did actually make sense! I booked a carrel in our library today, worked from 8.30 - 11, then 12 -2 then 2.30 - 5, all of it was productive reading and a faint outline for my lit review is beginning to form on paper rather than in my head.

We had burgers for dinner. Yum. I have also been taking fish oil which has sharpened my brain (IMHO) and the sun is shining.

The counselling will start after Easter, I think it will help & I am seriously considering see the chaplain as well. I've been asked to run a course before July, and had originally said yes but in fact I am going to make myself very unpopular and say no (only at draft stage at the moment). I need to focus, we're moving house too so that I am very close to campus and able to go back in the evenings. I am sure that this is only the beginning of a rollercoaster ride, but I *know* I'm interested in my research area and I *know* I can complete this project, I also seem to have found a comfortable place to work where I can concentrate. Now if I could just block distractions such as Facebook I'd be laughing!

Thank you muchly, I have sent off a request for student counselling and see them next Friday to see if I am eligible for an 8 week course - hopefully this will give me a chance to vent and make my 'study time' into study time as opposed to web surfing time.

I also went for a walk at lunchtime with a post doc friend and she suggested writing down my three ares of research and treating each of them like my MSc, aims, objective, methodology, likely outcomes etc. What data do I need, What software/skills do I need - and this should give some form to my reading.

I've also told myself firmly that if I can skim read and highlight three papers I can collect my daughter early from nursery. Thank you Ady, she is recovering but we won't know how she was affected until she doesn't do something she should or does do something she shouldn't. She spent her first 72 hours in a coma and then 2 weeks in intensive care so its been a nerve wracking waiting game, especially for a first time mum!

Hiya everyone - enjoying the sunshine?

I am now almost 3 months into my PhD, so far I have had about 3 weeks where I couldn't work due to picking up various bugs from my daughters nursery and my agreement to do 1/2 a days demonstrating in each week that i have 2 days childcare was a crazy mistake! My intention to work 3 days a week hasn't materialised and I confess I am beginning to wonder why I'm doing this.

I have attended a conference which I loved, was fascinated by the various questions people asked and I did (last week at least) want to make a go of it. This week with the sun shining and me missing my 8 month old baby very much indeed I feel as if i am drowning. I have been asked to do a presentation next week on my masters project but as yet haven't started that, and i am struggling to even remember what the various phd research questions were that my supervisor said were good.

I set myself the challenge to finish my draft lit review by the end of May - so about 8/9 weeks and even though i read lots of papers i can't seem to condense my thoughts. I have found some helpful advice online to develop my reading into a lit review but I can't seem to tie down the areas I should be reading about.

Another underlying ongoing issue is the health of my baby. Due to an error by medical staff she was born critically ill and it is nothing short of a miracle that she came home, so I have my head to get around all of that. My supervisory team are supportive when I have to take time off but I am just feeling pants.

Words of advice? Where do I go from here? I know I am capable of doing this project but I have lost my way somewhat, I feel I have a lot to live up to with agreeing to work part time in the office while accepting a full time schedule. I go to 3 days a week after Easter and no demostrating which I hope will help me, how much had everyone else done in their first three months?

thanks in advance.

Hiya everyone - enjoying the sunshine?

I am now almost 3 months into my PhD, so far I have had about 3 weeks where I couldn't work due to picking up various bugs from my daughters nursery and my agreement to do 1/2 a days demonstrating in each week that i have 2 days childcare was a crazy mistake! My intention to work 3 days a week hasn't materialised and I confess I am beginning to wonder why I'm doing this.

I have attended a conference which I loved, was fascinated by the various questions people asked and I did (last week at least) want to make a go of it. This week with the sun shining and me missing my 8 month old baby very much indeed I feel as if i am drowning. I have been asked to do a presentation next week on my masters project but as yet haven't started that, and i am struggling to even remember what the various phd research questions were that my supervisor said were good.

I set myself the challenge to finish my draft lit review by the end of May - so about 8/9 weeks and even though i read lots of papers i can't seem to condense my thoughts. I have found some helpful advice online to develop my reading into a lit review but I can't seem to tie down the areas I should be reading about.

Another underlying ongoing issue is the health of my baby. Due to an error by medical staff she was born critically ill and it is nothing short of a miracle that she came home, so I have my head to get around all of that. My supervisory team are supportive when I have to take time off but I am just feeling pants.

Words of advice? Where do I go from here? I know I am capable of doing this project but I have lost my way somewhat, I feel I have a lot to live up to with agreeing to work part time in the office while accepting a full time schedule. I go to 3 days a week after Easter and no demostrating which I hope will help me, how much had everyone else done in their first three months?

thanks in advance.

OK - I found the tips on reading few pages down - have assimilated info, half a packet of chocolate hobnobs and writing alongside in word. Also now remember when i did my MSc research that organisingt the subject areas i wanted to read about actually gave me a very good structure for the whole project & writeup.

Brain like a sieve......

Hi All,
Well I have to confess that I am enjoying absolutely everything so far, although that could be something to do with this being the first few weeks and also me having my own 'space' where I'm not mum for the first time in just over 6 months. First week was great, very productive, second week my baby girl caught a virus which ended up with a 999 dash to children's hospital and 48 hours under observation, my daughter was critically ill when born and we now know virus's (or viri?) are not great things for her!

Anyway - rambling - I am unsure as to the most efficient way to read the vast quantity's of papers which i need to read. I have endnote, which is great for organising me and I can add notes to that but I am not sure If I should be writing a paragraph for each paper to summarise what i think is the relevance or just tagging papers relavent or not relavent. Due to the piecemeal way i need to work I am already finding it hard to keep everything in my brain. Illustrated beautifully by my last meeting with my supervisor who asked me what paper i had found so far that was most relavent or thought-provoking and i blithered on about something barely relavent forgetting in fact i had read some very interesting things the week before but had forgotten them!

Thanks in advance :) amd thank you to all who convinced me i wasn,t mad :)

Wow - thank you everyone for taking the time to reply. I am about halfway through the 'How to get a phd' book and finding it very interesting reading - have been reading chunks to my baby to get her to sleep at night (it works - don't knock it!). As far as my motivation goes then it rolls around in a babygro and burps from time to time - I hope that she will sustain me through some of the darker stages, of which I am sure that there will be many.

Re Endnote - is that a package to buy or is it a Uni package - i.e. a site licence? I went into Uni on wed to register and felt like a very rubbish 18yo undergrad again not knowing where anything is or how anything works.

Thanks again everyone, Adi & Dunni, I take my hat off to you, I have no idea how people cope with two at the same age. Does as you say however make project management a doddle. I have managed to draw up a calander for the year showing where my DH and I have to cover the nursery closures, have arranged our holidays to also take into account uni & nursery closures and i've started writing a list of questions for my supervisor. I;ve also started some light reading online using google scholar to bring up articles I can investigate further once i have my Uni account.

I think my husband will also be spending long evenings alone with the sofa, but he too studies so I suspect it will be ok. I have stated I want us to have Sunday as a sacrosanct family day to enjoy together - fingers crossed!

;-)

Hi.
I am new. Very new. I start my PhD tomorrow and it would be fair to say I am totally bricking it! :p
I would have started in September '10 but a few weeks after accepting my phd offer i found out I was pregnant and the uni let me defer until January. I cannot afford (and nor do I want) F/T Childcare for my baby and so will have 3 days a week to work on my PhD to begin with, then increase gradually so that by my last year I intend to have that up to 5 days a week. And I will also have ad hoc c/care for when i am needed on campus - I would really like to get some demonstrating practice and also get involved in possible research opportunities.

I should add that I am now mid 30s having worked in industry for 11 years in the same field I am now doing research in, i did an MSc vis distance learning while working FT which was awarded an RGS prize and got a Distinction so I am pretty determined but having spent 8 months in a land of nappies and sleep deprivation I'm a bit concerned I've bitten off too much.

So. Am I mad? Is this unrealistic?

I also want to hit the ground running, have ordered my copy of 'how to get a phd', but would be very grateful for any tips to get myself working efficiantly right from the beginning. It is a sciencebased PhD but not lab based so I can work from home in the evenings as well.

Many thanks :-)