hi guys, am supposed to hand in 15000 words of my thesis in four weeks so that my supervisor can decided whether is should remain an Mphil or get promoted to PhD. the problem is that am lagging behind. i feel scared. is this normal. can anyone write a good thesis in four weeks? i just started my phd!!

This sounds like differentiation to me. I found that it wasn't so scary - I wrote ~9000 words in one month for my differentiation report, but this won't be part of my final thesis... I also had to do a short interview with my supervisor and one other member of staff. I had very few results by this stage, but the issue seemed to be more like 'with two more years work, will this work be enough to form a PhD thesis'. I don't think very many people fail differentiation.

DON'T WORRY! Quite frankly, if your supervisor thinks you should transfer to a PhD he/she will transfer you, regardless of the quality/quantity of your thesis. Same goes if he/she thinks you shouldn't. Unless you hand in absolute rubbish, which you certainly won't. Four weeks are plenty to put together a report, you just don't go out for 4 weeks and get it done.

If you really are lagging that far behind then get finished what you can and make sure the finished parts are complete. Don't fuss around with the figures too much, they don't have to be brilliant- they just have to show what they should and have decent figure legends.

Four weeks is possible, but you have to forget your fear and get down to it. Starting to write any new piece of work, even a new chapter in a dissertation you're already working on, is difficult and easy to ignore, but you just have to sit down and get SOMETHING on paper. Remember, you may be scared that it isn't your best work, but you don't get anything if you hand in nothing.

thanks guys...i've gotten down to it. 4000 words so far. am still going on. hope i can have time to go thro it. :(. i'll try not to be too anxious.

Oh how I fondly look back on the same situation! Yes, you can do it, you just need motivation!!! How to get it? Change the location you're working in. Swap your desk for the pub. One pint will do wonders for your imagination. Write scribbley notes longhand on bits of paper in the pub then go home and work from them. You'll look so impressively geeky it'll do wonders for your confidence.