I technically have 10 days before my deadline. I have to do...

1) change my lit review
2)write a load of stuff into my methods chapter and change a lot of existing stuff
3) add and change a lot of things to my chapter 4
4) re-write the qualitative results section of chapter 5
5) run analysis for chapter 6 and divide the chapter into two - then write a final discussion for it.
6) write a discussion chapter.
7) write an abstract
8) write acknowledgements
9)sort out references.

This is clearly NOT going to happen. But I'm hoping to aim for at least 1-5 done.

Today is focusing on 1) so...

Goal 1: sort out definition section.

I can't wait to get out from under my sup and stretch my writing legs a bit :-) I've been told by other academics that I write really well and clearly. I've submitted a few publications with sup with varying degrees of success. I really want to see how far a publication, without her tinkering, would get!

I'm not sure I really feel like I'm part of a 'sausage factory' type analogy :p what I do feel is that whatever I do, it isn't good enough for sup, she'll always change things. She does it to everyones work though. E.g. when I expressed concern to her RA and showed her my work with the tracked changes the RA looked horrified, but 6 months down the line, her work was given the same treatment. So I don't think its really anything wrong with my writing, I just think it happens to be sup's style. BUt it is extremely annoying and it constantly feels like you're not good enough. Coupled with the fact she only ever skim reads/reads 1st 2 pages and then makes wild judgements about what she *thinks* the work is about, it is very very irritating. I gave her my final draft 2 weeks ago and she read the first 3 pages of the lit review (I watched her read through it) and then told me to re-write the entire lit review and refused to read past the 3rd page.

However, when I'm through this hellish process I will have learnt a lot about how to motivate supervisees and how not to!

I can directly relate to this - in fact if you search old posts you'll probably find ones by me on the same topic.

My sup changes lots of things, and most are just annoying style changes, e.g. "However, there have been five studies" to "There have been five studies, however, that..." :-s

I've just had to accept it and grin and bear it. What I do do now though is I protect my word docs with a password when I send it to her and enforce track changes, so she can't turn it off :p it looks HORRIFIC when I get it back - almost completely red, but at least I can follow what she has done.

THe most annoying factor is she has never sat me down (even though I've asked) and explained WHY she makes the changes, so I don't feel I can ever learn from her changes.

like that idea too. I'd pay for it if it were me - worth it in the long run! although you could ask uni to pay?

Goal 1 done :-)

well, I've spent the first 30 mins of the day trying to get my laptop to work - just needed to re-start it but it was all frozen and being rubbish :-s

Goal 1: email student
Goal 2: write definition section

ok, well I've redone it. Rathre than having a 'summary of the research' (i.e. criticisms) and then 'contribution' I am having a 'summary and contribution' section so I have Issue, followed by my contribution that solves it. - otherwise I was WAY too repetitive.

Apparently I use the term 'approach' too often rather than being specific about whether its a theory, paradigm or epistemological stance. Usually its becasue I don't know. My sup says it comes across that I don't know :$

I should probably clarify. This section is at the end of my intro, which only introduces bits of research so..

Intro = what is the problem? what is the existing research on this participant group? (this is where I'm putting the contribution section)

Lit review = what has been done on the specific problem? (but no research done on this participant group) - what are the problems with the research..(that the approaches are a bit rubbish) and then why my approach is amazing.

I really don't think I can expand it any more. I reckon I've got about 5 points. I have made a big contribution though, as essentially there has been NO research on pengiuns ;-)

She hasn't actually said I need this section, I kind of assumed I did though.

I have no idea what I'm doing now lol. This is in my intro - I've summed up the existing research problems and then have a section of contributions of the thesis where I was going to bullet point why my research addressed the problems.

When I got feedback from my sup she said I needed to make points clearer, break paragraphs up and put headings everywhere i.e. no more than 2 paragraphs without a new heading. So I thought bullet points would help me achieve this. Or is it too babyish?

ok to go with bullet points?

i.e. "this thesis focuses on penguins and therefore makes several contributions to the field":
- addresses limitations in existing literature by looking at penguins on beaches as well as on the ice (the african kind of penguin)
- provides an analysis of how penguins don't really look like the chocolate biscuit of the same name
- Demonstrates the importance of examining penguins in their natural habitat and not going on 'batman' representations of penguins.

ooh actually reference support would be fab. I have an entire thesis that either has no refs in bits or the refs are wrongly formatted. I need my entire mendeley database gone through and each reference changed e.g. adding in journal names or the correct initials etc.

For me the phrase "well what you really need to do is just get on with it" makes me rage. I just want to scream back "WHAT THE F*** DO YOU THINK I AM DOING!!" :-s

What would benefit me the most right now?

1) spider catcher person
2) cup of tea maker - but not someone who wants attention every time they bring tea to me
3) someone to do all the housework and cooking so I just do the PhD and nothing else
4) someone to read through all the emails I get from students and reply to them lol. that would be great!

Sorry to hear that star-shaped, something will come along though, it always does!

I can't believe your writing your abstract and acknowledgements. I have MAJOR structural changes to make to my thesis and we submit at the same time. I actualy hate my supervisor for leaving it so late to tell me all this. I have no idea how it will all be done on time. Worst of all, I hate submitting something that isn't perfect i.e. all formatted, referenced properly and I just won't have time to do all that. She even said "when are you thinking of submitting" to me the other day - ermm, I've already notified the uni (on her request) that I'm submitting in september! I can't believe she's forgotten that. gah! sorry for the rant, but am so peed off and stressed by the whole thing.