Definite sympathy, but I wonder how that happened, I have always thought that the external was supposed to be chosen wisely, and the supervisors were supposed to see to it that a fail would be very unlikely, after all, there are so many hurdles along the way that to have got so far through the system with nobody picking up any problems seems a bit strange. If they were as bad as suggested then there must be some appeal process? Was her supervisor present, and can they throw some light on it?

could do, but I bet others who use this computer will object! Plus its a new monitor and so I've just plugged it in, no looking at the instructions of course. I've also put office 2007 on here, now thats another thing entirely - I had to go to help to find out how to print something yesterday :$ and to think at one point I taught IT at evening classes!

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this new colour schems is really bright, :-( too bright, now where did I put my sunglasses???

i hope so, although the choice of supervisors is going to make it pretty clear where it may be heading. I had to rewrite my proposal title so, - in the words of my super -, they won't know what it is really about. Which is how a seemingly small change can make major changes in education possible by 'the back door' and my argument builds through the chapters to show how this will be possible. There has to be a lot of proof for my small change mainly because(and I think it is fairly widespread across education whatever is being discussed) they will not accept this change could be so influential because it doesn't involve teachers directly only indirectly, and it is their lack of concern that may well be their ultimate downfall. (gosh that sounds so dramatic , sort of watch this space!. I'm going to keep it quite secret by the choice of chapters i submit and presentations I do, without the final piece it all looks quite innocent and just a fairly middle of the road evaluation!

you could put in a general search in your area in something like swetswise, which may bring up some titles. My area is also very sparse when it comes to actual subject-specific material and I think it came up with three atricles, but when I put in a search of a slightly more general nature it gave me some articles in journals that I hadn't even thought of looking at, but which might just have the odd thing looked at from a slightly different angle, but still possibly useful, so that might be worth a try. Or ask your academic librarian?

I've been watching too, but I've switched it off now.... and come on here Arghhhhh!!!!! Promise I'll get something done today, maybe after lunch???

goodness, I wanted to keep my conclusions for the big finale, thought about having a fanfare, fireworks the lot! . My super says I have the conclusions under wraps so that the powers that be don't realise the true nature of what I am going to suggest . The only thing I have for the main intro so far are loads of papers. What have people put in their main intro? As my research is in education I was going to start with some of the great thinkers in the area, to lead on to the lit review which is all about the radical thinkers of our time - well at least those I know of of course, but I want to leave other stuff to the appropriate chapters as mine is probably 90%+ literature and only a small part is 'fieldwork' such is the nature of the study. What I have done though is do a draft abstract. someone here (sits on one of the boards)said that a good way to sort out where you are going is to write and rewrite the abstract as you go along, so I'm giving that a whirl.

Read the 'suthoring a PhD' book by Dunleavy it has lots of useful advice for sorting out chapters etc. and is well worth reading. Actually the number of times that book appears on this site suggests we should be getting some kind of commission!

You may want to check with those who deal with the admin side as here they like to see the lit review as one of the two you get ticked off before you go before the upgrade board and are left in peace to get on with the thing your own way.

Do you mean should you be taking note of any adverse effect your research could have, or the possible effects various promises could have on your final work? If you look on various university websites, they usually have some guidelines and some even have examples, they are probably worth a look. Ethics considerations pop up where you least expect them!

course they do, but on the other hand, without any planning you could find that you are out of tea just after the shops have closed

Just gonna take the dog, then I'm going to get down to the first bit of reading of the day, however I am feeling rather pleased with myself as I have put loads of stuff into files for each chapter instead of having it in heaps- yet to read it all, but at least I know where it is now-, um... except for the pile in the garage of course (!), so feel a break is deserved - Will get tea when daughter returns from shopping, with bikkies I hope!

Thing is though, you don't always know if what you are doing is productive. You might spend a whole week doing something and then decide it isn't going to be of any real use, or you might find that if you get one of those moments when you realise that inspiration has struck and you can condense a whole 2,000 words into one succinct paragraph, - so in theory the time you have spent slaving over all those words has been for naught, but thats the way it goes. I've spent two days sorting out my haphazard pile of stuff into chapters, which was a bit of an Ah Ha moment. This has obviously not been very productive as far as the writing bit goes, but it should help no-end in the future and I can slot other bits in as I find them, instead of losing them, or forgetting I've already printed them off.

Not sure where you can get a definition of language, but I suppose it could be described as something that can be taught (as in a subject for GCSE or the like, not as you might get taught at acting school for a part in a play)whereas a dialect is something more specific to a particular area, an example is the use of the term 'mardy baby' which is common from nottingham upwards, but is - or used to be- rarely understood further south, in fact this is a term I was told about years ago, and because it is so descriptive I have used it even though I'm a Londoner, but someone I met who also knew the term immediately thought I was from Nottingham. The various terms used for others, such as love, me duck etc. are also I think dialect type variations, some of which cause offence when applied to people of another area!

Just thought I'd put in a quick reply for you! Having just said goodbye to my second supervisor, who really didn't understand what I was doing and wanted to make it all about teachers. I've got another second supervisor, who should be better - but has loads of enthusiasm and being only part time I just hope I can keep up! My thesis also depends upon a lot of printed stuff, some of which is written by these two, who work closely together on occasions, and who probably know many of the other people I will be quoting and I'm just hoping I get the gist of their arguments right, it would be horrible if they said ' thats not what I meant at all'