nearly there ... must keep going! (thesis writeup)

[Mathmo]

I've nearly finished my thesis! Nearly ... I have about 4000 words to write (I have rough notes / bullet points but I need to turn them into prose) and 3000 words to cut (for a 20,000 word total). But all the thinking is done, I know what my findings and conclusions are, which are the bits I still need to write properly.

I need to do everything by Saturday evening, because I can then email the final "I think this is genuinely finished" version to my supervisor for a quick once-over and to a friend who's offered to proof read; I'm then busy Sun-Mon-Tues and can hopefully sort out any last little wee edits based on their comments on Tuesday evening before printing. And then I can go to Cambridge on Wednesday, get it bound, and hand it in!

Any inspirational words of wisdom? I think I have pretty well developed study habits and stuff, I know I just need to keep going and keep working at it. Most of it has been written in intense chunks over the last 6 weeks, so I know I can get the last bit done in these next 3 days if I pile on the pressure and keep working away at it ... but any help in keeping that pressure on and motivation high would be great!

[great girl wonder]

Good job!

Take breaks, you'll think better after you've relaxed a little. Also a little will help the wheels grind freer.

Good luck.

[rowan]

You can do it!!!!

[cwbyrvr]

You can do it all night long!

Though all-nighters are not actually recommended.

[Bork]

You are SO CLOSE!!! That is fantastic - keep up the great work!!!!


<-- for when your own brain feels fried

[Sonic#]

A thesis is a big deal, and you've nearly finished it. You've got this!

Just remember that it's probably better than you think it is, and at the same time it's not going to be perfect. If you are revising with that in mind, you will avoid the sentence-anguish that I went through.

[octarineoboe]

Sounds like you're in good shape, so yay you!

Make sure to celebrate when you're finished

[Mathmo]

Thanks guys. I've realised that I will have to basically write the 4000 words tomorrow ... which, at least, is motivating me to try and get ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING ELSE done tonight! (lots of editing, cutting, and generating content for that 4000 words).

(ETA: that is, writing it all tomorrow so I have time to read through and edit on Saturday)

[Mathmo]

aaaaarg this is SO HARD, why does it have to be SO HARD?

(estimate revised down from 4000 words to write to 3000 words to write. 1500 words written. Also, 6000 words edited, down from 8000 words. Editing is so much easier than writing. I MUST write more tonight so that tomorrow I can just finish editing)

[monk]

you're doing great! keep at it. Stay off the forums! Focus, just a little more and you will be finished.

I dont remember, have you shared with us your topic/title?

[Mathmo]

Hey, I've written about 2000 words! This is good and it seems to be getting easier, which is definitely good.

I've probably not mentioned my topic - I'm looking at students making the transition to university, and what it's like in their first term (here in the UK we have 3 terms to an academic year, which I think is different from in the US). There's not a lot of research in maths education that takes a holistic (i.e. including both academic and social) view, which I think is really important (for me, e.g., my friends from the sci fi society? were totally relevant to my academic progress: they gossiped about which lecturers were good, or told me about online notes, and all sorts of other useful things). So I've done a few case studies, looking at students' experiences of "being at University as a maths student" as a whole, sort of thing.

[rowan]

Interesting. I would not have even thought about research on that.

(I went to a school on trimesters but it is rare in the US)

[Mathmo]

(I'm assuming it's OK to break the normal wait-til-2-people-post rules given the purpose of this thread ...)

It seems to be quite a hole in the literature (which is good because it then meant whatever I found it would make a contribution). There's a lot of (not maths-specific) stuff on transition that mostly backs up the obvious: if you don't want your students to drop out of college, they need to both engage with their courses AND make friends and feel welcome! Some students have trouble developing the necessary study/organisational skills to cope; recognising this is useful! There's also stuff on maths-specific university courses, mostly going "why is such-and-such hard for students?" (e.g. proof, abstract algebra, mathematical notation). But there isn't very much that looks at both, and I think it's important to look at things holistically. For example, you might have a student who gets to Uni and goes "oh crap ... I've always been good at maths and found it easy but now it's really hard ... why am I here? what am I doing? who am I if I'm not "the one who's good at maths?"" and withdraws socially and eventually drops out - and I think taking either an academics-only or a social-only view will mean you probably miss that story since the identity crisis and the poor academic performance are intertwined.

I've written 3000 words! This means I've made the "oh boy I have to make this many words or I don't see how I can possibly finish tomorrow" threshold. Another 1000 would be good and would make tomorrow easier, but now I don't have to panic.

[octarineoboe]

Don't panic! (and always know where your towel is)

Glad to hear you're on track. Your topic is really interesting - I'm curious about how your work intersects with the antisocial-nerd stereotype.

[Mathmo]

17142 words done. Just a bit more to do ... 1760 words to edit, and then another 1000-1500 to write ... (and I'm nearly 2 hours past my self-imposed deadline of 6pm, but this is why i set it at 6pm, so that if it took longer I could still finish it tonight ...)

[Mathmo]

18474. Can't wait for this to be done.

[Mathmo]

Done. Bedtime now.

[rowan]

HOOORAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hope you have a wonderful, well-earned sleep.

[Mathmo]

Thanks I got a decent amount of sleep, which was good!

Aaaand, I've now had feedback both from my supervisor and from my wonderful proof-reading-friend (they both emailed on Monday evening). And they thought it was very good! (one of the weirdest things about doing this is that I did essays and stuff at 6th form (end of high school level) and then didn't do anything that needed academic writing until now, at Master's level, where you don't get much feedback.)

I have some small changes to make - my supervisor pointed out that I've phrased the same question differently in 2 different places and I should make them the same, and my friend has been amazingly helpful and sent me the pdf of my thesis back with highlighted bits where there are words missing / silly commas / in a few cases slightly alternative wording for sentences. Little edits like that. I am very grateful for them to getting these bits back to me yesterday because it means I can make the edits this morning, rather than at midnight tonight. And then I can print it all! And be ready to hand in tomorrow! Yay!