Key study skills for postgraduate taught students

Jenni RoddFaculty Tutor, PGT

j.rodd@ucl.ac.uk

…with thanks to Rachel Benedyk

Today's Objectives

• Thinking about reading

• Structuring your writing

• Avoiding plagiarism

Why do we read?

Do you always know exactly why you are reading something?

• Overview of new topic• Looking for specific information• Looking for other sources to read

How do we read?

• Skimming• Rapid• Detailed

Think of a study situation when you would apply each of these types of reading

What do we read?

• Journal articles• Textbooks• Other books• Directed reading• Suggested reading• What do your lecturers/colleagues read?

• Internet?

Reading resources

Read the internet?

• Think of one study example where the internet would be a good source of reading material, and one where it would be a bad source.

Managing your reading

Time is precious!• Choose your reading very carefully• Always be reading something• Usually take notes• Ask questions:

– “Why am I reading this?”– “Is it worth reading?”– “Does this make sense?”– “Would I have done that?”– “What is the ‘message’?”

Critical Evaluation During Reading

Never accept anything a face value:• Is the logic of the argument flawed?• Are there alternative explanations of data?• Are there other experiments that need to be

done?• Are there factors that haven’t been controlled?• Are the right questions being asked?

Structuring your writing

Writing is hard

• Factual stuff is easy– this academic stuff is hard!

• Who are you telling?• the lecturer? (probably not)• a fellow student? a friend?

All Writing has a Message• What is your Message?• Never deviate from the message• Remember the order of information the reader will need• Don’t include stuff irrelevant to the message

***avoid ‘everything I know’ writing***The message might be:

– “The answer to this question is definitely X”But more likely:– “The answer is probably X, but we need more evidence to be sure”Or even:– “We don’t know the answer to this question yet, because …”

• Don’t be afraid to offer an opinion backed up by a convincing argument

Beginning writing• Lots of ways…

– What is the main message?– Group and order everything you know to convey this

message.

• Don’t be afraid to throw away and start again• Don’t view rewriting as ‘failure’

• Do you need to know what you are going to say before you start writing?

***** Practise! *****

• You have to practise• Write often• Get feedback often

– I would NEVER submit work without asking someone else to read it first

• Read and criticise often– Reading the work of others improves our writing

Academic writing style should be clear and simple!

Consider:

Don’t leave yourself open to accusations of having a tendency of building redundancy into your written work. You would probably be well advised to take extreme care not to use many more words than are strictly necessary; that kind of writing behaviour is of no use to anybody and, because it is highly superfluous, will not encourage the people who read your words to be overly impressed.

• Be concise • Avoid complicated jargon – never try to sound ‘clever’

Useful Books and Links

• M. Cutts, “Plain English Guide” • Strunk & White, “The Elements of Style” • On-Line English Grammar

http://www.edufind.com/english/grammar/index.cfm

• Advice on academic writing http://www.writing.utoronto.ca/advice

• Frequently found faults in students’ written work - an interactive illustrative site from another university: http://www.staffs.ac.uk/schools/business/bsadmin/staff/s3/fff.htm

• Critical reading towards critical writing http://www.writing.utoronto.ca/advice/reading-and-researching/critical-reading

• Take a look at this site, and I recommend you download the “marked assignment.doc” from the Assessment Material section http://www.staffs.ac.uk/schools/business/bsadmin/staff/s3/jamr.htm#Reading%20techniques

Avoiding plagiarism

PlagiarismWhat is it?• the passing off of another person's work as if it were your

own

How can it happen? • most frequently occurs as the copying, word for word, of

parts of a published or unpublished work without any form of acknowledgement

• copying another student’s work• recycling your own work from a previous assignment• employing a ghostwriter to produce work for you• using someone else's ideas without citing them

It is still plagiarism even if….• the work copied has not been published• you’ve altered the odd word here or there

Collusion

What about group assignments?• you must produce your own, independent write-up• if you use the same data set, then each student must

conduct their own analysis and draw their own conclusions from the shared data

• if in doubt, ask for clarification before doing any work

Will you get caught?• It’s REALLY easy to spot it!!

– Your lecturers have read the books you are likely to be reading (and the work of your fellow students!) and will recognise copied passages

– Changes in style of writing (from your words to those of another author) are easy to spot

– Anything you find on the web will pop up if we type it into google!!

– A sophisticated detection system (Turnitin®) scans work for evidence of plagiarism• access to billions of sources worldwide

(websites, journals previously submitted coursework)

What are the consequences?• If plagiarism is detected

– you may have to explain yourself to a university panel – the piece of work will normally be given 0%  – the matter will be noted on your student file.

Good work practices

• DO NOT leave things to the last minute– pressure will tempt you to skip corners– start writing as soon as possible– make sure you understand the assignment

• DO NOT write essays with the relevant sources open in front of you

• DO learn how to cite and quote work correctly

QuotingDirect quotes should be used sparingly• one or two at most• use only because the original is so exquisitely beautiful• too often suggests you do not understand the material

Direct quotes should be wrapped in quotation marks, followed by citation and page numbers, eg:

As Young states, the assumption “reflects real cross relationships between the judgments about choices made by a person, and cannot be avoided … the reality is that people are often forced to make rapid and radical revisions of their estimates of the correctness of particular options as they work their way through [the options available]” (Young, 1998, p. 474).

The Reference SectionReferencing is a common source of error in student

work• make sure you get it right

• sloppiness gives the impression you do not care

• learn how to reference properly

Referencing is different for different sources

• http://www.apastyle.org/faqs.html covers everything including books, journal articles, websites, interviews etc

Main Points(my three messages!)

• Your time is valuable, so make sure that all reading has a specific purpose

• Academic writing is VERY hard, but gets easier with practice and feedback

• Plagiarism is a serious issue and must be avoided!

Any questions?

Any suggestions from your own experience?