Have they not covered that in your research skills yet? That's awful.
Ok. A summary of how I manage it. 1. Layout your structure with headings to end any blank page issues. 2. Fill in your method section 3. Fill in your result s section selecting 2 or 3 plots that most explain your data. 4. From doing this, pick the purpose of your paper. The one/two things that you want to say and what you can prove from your data. In text describe but do not discuss your data. 5. Stick this purpose into the introduction as bullet points. Likewise in your conclusion in bullet points. 6. Bullet point your discussion section. Just odds and sods. You can put more in on editing later. Talk about the data you've presented and what it means. 7. Bullet point your introduction. Background to the field, a clear set of objectives for the data you're presenting (not the whole project, just what you're presenting in yhe paper), include recent important and relevant literature that backs up why you dis what you did. 8. Go through the whole thing and check that the stuff you've written in text and bullet points makes sense and ia in a good order. 9. Turn any bullet points into single sentences (or short paragraphs if complicated) 10. And voila, one first draft. You are now ready to start editing.
I haven't actually started grad school yet, but my prof decided that we were going to publish the results from my undergrad thesis. (Though we didn't actually cover writing full-length papers in research skills class either. We did more on presentation skills, which I think was pretty useful.)
Sounds so far like what I'm doing! I just wrote the second half of methodology and have the beginnings of results. (The first half of the methodology I think I'll just copy over from my thesis with some minor adjustments.) Indeed, I think the most daunting part is figuring out the purpose of the paper. I suspect that I have enough material from my project to make a decently-long one, but my prof keeps going on about maybe doing the paper as a comparison thing with his earlier work. I personally think those could be two separate things. I guess he's taking a PI role in the authorship so I have to write the majority of it :D
Ok. A summary of how I manage it.
1. Layout your structure with headings to end any blank page issues.
2. Fill in your method section
3. Fill in your result s section selecting 2 or 3 plots that most explain your data.
4. From doing this, pick the purpose of your paper. The one/two things that you want to say and what you can prove from your data. In text describe but do not discuss your data.
5. Stick this purpose into the introduction as bullet points. Likewise in your conclusion in bullet points.
6. Bullet point your discussion section. Just odds and sods. You can put more in on editing later. Talk about the data you've presented and what it means.
7. Bullet point your introduction. Background to the field, a clear set of objectives for the data you're presenting (not the whole project, just what you're presenting in yhe paper), include recent important and relevant literature that backs up why you dis what you did.
8. Go through the whole thing and check that the stuff you've written in text and bullet points makes sense and ia in a good order.
9. Turn any bullet points into single sentences (or short paragraphs if complicated)
10. And voila, one first draft. You are now ready to start editing.
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Sounds so far like what I'm doing! I just wrote the second half of methodology and have the beginnings of results. (The first half of the methodology I think I'll just copy over from my thesis with some minor adjustments.) Indeed, I think the most daunting part is figuring out the purpose of the paper. I suspect that I have enough material from my project to make a decently-long one, but my prof keeps going on about maybe doing the paper as a comparison thing with his earlier work. I personally think those could be two separate things. I guess he's taking a PI role in the authorship so I have to write the majority of it :D
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