My Dad

Three days ago my Dad died.

He was a major force in my educational history, so I'm going to share a few things with you concerning how he inspired me.

He believed passionately in lifelong learning. When his eyesight failed him, he read audio books and when his hearing failed him he read audio books AT HIGH VOLUME. He never stopped taking in new knowledge.

When I told him I was considering applying for university at the age of 27 he said, "about bloody time!" He could have said 'play safe and keep your job', but he didn't.

He also believed that nothing's worth doing if it's easy. When I was at uni this phrase drove me nuts. WHY COULDN'T IT BE EASY??? He'd shrug and say, 'because then anyone could do it'.

I hope you have someone who encourages, provokes, inspires or supports you. I'll be back at uni next week so if you want a lend of any of my Dad's words of encouragement you've only to ask.

I know he'd have liked that.

Do you feel like a student yet?

How do you become a student?

Sign up to a course? Well that's the first step but fundamentally that means you've completed some basic admin. I don't think that makes you a student.

How about attend some lectures? Well you can be in a room and learn next to nothing if you're not engaged. Attending lectures could mean you've managed to read your timetable-it doesn't make you a student.

Write assignments? I suppose that's part of it, but you can probably pass things with the minimum effort. I've passed things without learning much of note. It didn't make me a student.

Here's what I think - students are created from a desire to learn new things, to test the parameters of our own understanding and to take pleasure in the slow revealing of new knowledge. That isn't always straightforward, in fact it's often the exact opposite. We don't like uncertainty or feeling out of our depth. Well guess what? That's part of becoming a student too. It shouldn't be easy.

We have all at some point read academic material that we haven't understood but persevered nevertheless. That's how you become a student.

We have all juggled the academic and the personal and somehow managed both areas. That's how you become a student.

We have all regretted starting something but refused to give in. That's how you become a student.

But eventually, slowly, through progress that sometimes feels like root canal treatment, you increase your understanding.

And one day you wake up with a working knowledge of your topic and enough confidence to tell other people about what you know. Guess what? At that point you're a student.

Critical Thinking

Tomorrow I'll be seeing some of you for a lecture on critical thinking.
So in addition to the oh-so-lucky ones who are attending, I thought I'd give a general explanation as to what critical thinking is.

Put simply, it's about questioning everything and not assuming facts are unchanging. Because they're not.
Facts are transient, like opinions, countries, people and theories. So that's what tomorrow will partly be about. It'll also touch on how you can pick apart theories and research too. This is a tremendous skill to have in readiness for your dissertation, because the option to be more refined in your selection of materials is key in final year.

We have loads of books (both electronic and paper) which cover the skills required to be a critical thinker. The e-book I'd recommend as a starting point is this one by Aveyard but there's plenty of others on the shelves.

One more thing.
Any of you who've had sessions with me previously will know that I'm interested in engaging with you. Not just talking at you but having a proper two-way conversation. Tomorrow will be no different. However, there are times to speak and times to stay quiet and listen and I've recently been involved in conversations between students and lecturers on the thorny issue of classroom disruption.

In my lectures and training sessions you get one chance. If you continue to talk over me, use your phone or disrupt others I will ask you to leave. My time with students is too precious to be wasted.

That aside, I'm hoping that the lecture will confuse, bemuse and eventually inform you.

See you tomorrow, second years.

A guide to sessions with dissertation supervisors

At present I can summarise the content of my email inbox like this: aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrgggghhhhh, HEEEEEEEEELLLLPPP, aaaaargggh. This is typically followed by the sound of explosions or crying or wine bottles being opened. Welcome to the sound of final year students having the most enormous meltdown.

Why? Because it's that time of year when dissertation planning tends to reach a peak of anxiety.
My advice is very, very simple. Work through it steadily and you'll be absolutely fine. Don't binge-search because it isn't effective. Instead it leads to frustration and boredom.

You should also be having conversations and discussions with your supervisors by now too.

So here's my advice to get the best from these precious sessions...

1) Go back and read about the major 'isms'. By this I mean feminism, post-modernism, essentialism, functionalism and Marxism. A chapter on each would be fine to refamiliarise yourself with what they say. Alternatively use an online encyclopedia such as Credo to go back to basics. This is the Wikipedia that you can reference.

2) Don't turn up for meetings expecting to be told what to do. It's your dissertation so own it. That means do plenty of prep before you see supervisors and send them things in advance so that they know what's to be discussed.

3) Some supervisors will set deadlines and some won't so you may need to negotiate when things are done. My advice is to set mini-deadlines rather than fixate on the final one. That could take the form of 'this section finished in two weeks' or '500 words written by this date'. It'll take the pressure off as you go along.

4) Remember it's a negotiation. Be diplomatic. Knowing when to be firm and when to concede points comes from a position of knowledge. In other words, read and read and read. It's the only way and there's no short cuts. It's how you win arguments and it's how you write about things that interest you.

5) Finally, think about the methodology in detail. Don't leave it until the end. This is one of those things that drives supervisors crazy so make it clear in meetings that you're thinking about these issues now, because it won't wait until after Christmas.

Hopefully that will help keep you on track.
You know where I am if you need me. Just don't expect me to reply within 10 seconds of reading another message that begins, "aaaargggghhh...heeeeelp....."

Anna's thoughts on dissertation planning

As a visual learner I am constantly having to organise my thoughts! 

Examtime mind maps are an excellent way to elaborate on my understanding. Take a look at my working progress mind map on Social Research Methods, full of all that irritating terminology, but it becomes so much easier once I've visualised it, I can then go on to check it with others and edit whenever I need to, I can also print and put the latest installment into my ARC folder. (Expecting a lot of corrections thrown at me now that I've had the guts to put it out there.) This was a good way to exercise my brain and recheck all my notions in my social research books.

 

https://www.examtime.com/p/1244298-Social-Research-Methods-mind_maps 

 

Alongside that I am communicating with my dissertation supervisor, throwing out my ideas and having them refined and channeled into good old fashioned hard work, but at least I can pat myself on the back!

 

So that's step 2 to for my third and final year of university - what have you done so far?

This year's workshops

Last year I ran fortnightly workshops which was open to all.

Apart from a few super-keen students who came along regularly, I saw neither hide nor hair of any of you.
This year will be different.
My plan is simply that I promote these things until you give in and come along.

This is what's going to happen; roughly every two week I'll sit in Training Room 1 waiting for you to turn up and ask me things. I'll then answer those things and you'll go away happier and more informed.

The pragmatic thinking behind this is quite simple; there's too many of you for me to fit into my working week as individual appointments. The workshops will allow me to answer similar inquiries and hopefully satisfy more students.

The more fluffy thinking is that I want you to feel more empowered by what you're studying.
That comes from knowing what you're doing, knowing the tricks (and they are tricks) to being a student and getting the most for WHAT YOU'VE PAYED FOR.

The first few workshops will run on the following days at 2pm in Training Room 1 in the LRC:

November 5th.

November 19th.

December 3rd.

December 17th.

It doesn't matter whether you're 2nd year undergrad or final year postgrad, just come along at any point between 2pm and 3pm and I'll do my best to answer your questions.

One final thing that'll be different from last year - I now regularly bake muffins so I promise a selection will be available for each workshop. See? Now you're interested...

Alan

Introducing my first columnist...

Hello. As much as I love writing posts and communicating generally I'm also very keen to open up these pages to students. One of the central tenets I try to teach by is the simple notion that information should, wherever possible, be a two-way thing. If I learn things from you it keeps me engaged in the subject and makes me a better librarian. With that in mind, I've always liked the idea of having guest posters on Bedtimes and Deadlines.

So Anna, who for no other reason than she's a good egg and has things to say, has agreed to write the occasional post for us this year. These will be student-focused in some way but could be about pretty much anything.
If you want to see what she's blogged about previously then her output on the Social Sciences Student Blog can be found here. It's very good.

Over to Anna...

My name is Anna McGough. I am not native to Luton but have lived and worked here since 2009, and began studying at the UoB in 2012. Now in my final year of my Child and Adolescent Studies Degree, I write to solidify what I have learned academically and the tricks of existence I entertain as I study and work part time.

Sooo…time to brush off the cobwebs and get back into "Uni Mode". No more money making overtime employment opportunities, no more 24/7 drinking binges and living it up like it's 1969 (and all that implies). If you're one of those students that didn't get around to the reading list that you wrote up back in April, then now is the time to take that scout motto and beCOME prepared!

I started a week ago, FINALLY clearing out my laptop's desktop, putting all those lectures and notes into their neat little folders…regretfully I lost a lot of useful stuff by carelessly deleting files but I have the most important things. I did a little reformatting and repair job on my laptop (once I'd backed it up) giving it some space and hopefully to dodge that dreaded crash that always seems to come when you're most valuable work is about to be saved (ie. dissertation!).

Ambled down to the bookshop JohnSmiths (http://www.johnsmith.co.uk/bedfordshire) and picked up some 2nd hand books at 30% cheaper (thanks last years students who cashed your books there instead of letting them gather dust after your graduation!), and I HAVE to tell you of this nifty notebook I found in Staples: ARC. As you can see from the pictures and tutorials it is a reasonably inexpensive way to organise your notebook the way you want it, with lined paper, blank pages, poly pockets, dividers, slides to stash your handouts and it you're as obsessed as me you can even buy your own puncher to transform your own papers and slot them right in! I paid £22 for my setup, take a look - loving filling it in!

How to be curious about everything

The major development at home this Summer has been the arrival of two kittens called Arya and Audrey. If you don't like cats then a) this post is probably not for you and b) WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU???? But that aside, they are fluffy and purry and little and utterly gorgeous in every way.

They're also madly curious about everything they come across.

It doesn't matter if it's a worm, a shoe, an empty box or a piece of fluff, everything has to be examined from every angle, prodded, thrown up in the air and eventually tested for edibility. 

The more I watch their indefatigable curiosity, the more I think what a brilliant outlook it must be; to see potential and wonder in any encounter with every new thing. 

They seem to see opportunity in everything. 

So when we shortly reconvene for another year of assignments, shenanigans, turmoil and triumphs, one of my messages will be to 'be curious'. Try and take pleasure in the finding of new things, new theorists, new music and new friends. This isn't one of those hypocrisy moments either - I'm going to be learning about new areas of research this year, and as mad as it may sound I think it's partly inspired by Arya and Audrey taking pleasure in the thrill of the new.

So here's to curiosity and every social science student (and kitten) who looks at the world as a giant adventure playground.

Skype

Hello again.

I've just set myself up with a university Skype account, the intention being to use it to support students who are away from campus for whatever reason. I've no idea whether this will be popular or not, but I like trying new things and anything that makes people feel supported and less isolated is clearly a good thing.

What I'll do next is come up with a schedule of the days and times when I'll offer Skype sessions (I'll take advice from your lecturers to ensure it doesn't clash with key lectures) and then publicise it through BREO announcements, lecture drop ins and the blog.

If you've got any immediate thoughts on this idea then email me or leave a comment at the bottom of this post. Do remember that you'll need to sign in before you can comment though.
What I'd ideally like to know is do you use Skype already and would you potentially use it for library appointment purposes?

Hope you're enjoying your Summer,

Alan

A warm welcome to our Frontliners

It's always an exciting and uncertain time when new courses start up; students getting to know each other as well as new lecturers and new academic demands. This week sees the commencement of Frontline, a new course in Social Work and I'm sure that excitement and anxiety will be present in abundance.

Just try and remember this-there's always a team of people whose job it is to support you and provide you with the best student experience possible. My part in that process is to ensure that you know where to find resources and how to get the best from them. I do loads of other things too but many of them spring from that simple first step of finding the best information available for the task in hand.

I hope you learn loads of new things and occasionally enjoy yourself along the way!

Alan 

The do's and don'ts of emailing authors for help and advice.

I get a lot of emails. I mean a lot. Loads.
One rule I've always had is that I answer them in the order they arrive, which means no skipping about to open the ones that look most interesting. So even if I see one from a student which is spelt wrong and contains four words in total I still answer it. But here's the thing - if you send me an email from your smart phone you must put something in the subject box. If you don't, my inbox will think it's spam and I'll probably never see it.

The reason I'm telling you this is because the care you put into your email is important. I don't expect perfect essays, but I do expect something which makes grammatical sense. And if you write a good email to published academics the results can be spectacular which is what this post is about.

Let's say you're a second year who's starting to think about a possible dissertation topic. Your initial searches keep throwing up the same author so you read some of her stuff; it's good, it makes sense and you like it. You also notice that as part of the abstract record on DISCOVER you can see the author's email address. Sometimes it'll be a .ac.uk address if the author works at a UK university. So my advice is email her and ask for advice. She's the expert, she's the person you're going to be quoting so see what else she's got. Sometimes (and this happens every year to a handful of final year students) the author may have good recommendations or even unpublished work they're willing to share.

But the email you write to them is important. Make sure you've read enough of the author's work so you know their stuff a little at least. Why? Because academics are susceptible to flattery just like anyone else. So tell her why you like her stuff. It helps, believe me. Take your time with the email, make sure the spelling and grammar are spot on and then see what happens. If you get a response you can even reference the email in your dissertation. Rather brilliantly it's your name that comes first in the reference so you'll be referencing yourself!

If you don't get a response then you've lost nothing apart from the few minutes writing the email. However, I find that most authors do respond. Researchers and academics want to share, they want their research to be read and referenced. Just don't begin your email to them with 'Deer Sit or Adam, can I nave soms free journal farticles' because I think you'll be waiting a while for a response.

You know where I am if you need me.


 

Why Karl Marx would have loved Oasis

Sometimes we make odd connections between seemingly disparate things.

For reasons I can't quite remember I was recently trying to explain the overall traits of some social theorists to a student. It wasn't going well. Previously, I'd talked to this student about music, which had gone well.

Which is why I eventually started likening various social theorists to rock bands.

So with that in mind, and in honour of High Fidelity, here's my top 5 social theorists as bands.





1. Max Weber = The Beatles. Reason? Both were obsessed with the stories of individuals and religion in modern society. However, Weber was a better drummer than Ringo.










2. Michel Foucault = Radiohead. Reason? Both have a reputation for being difficult, dense and slippery. Furthermore, both make more sense when taken as a whole body of work.

3. Karl Marx = Oasis. Reason? Many liked the early stuff but eventually it all sounded chuggingly similar and hasn't aged well.











4. Emile Durkheim = The Velvet Underground. Reason? Both did something totally new, both wrote about suicide and both inspired a hundred copyists.











5. Anthony Giddens = The Rolling Stones. Reason? Both have been remarkably consistent and both began their careers by taking earlier classics and reinterpreting them.
Anthony Giddens didn't play at Madison Square Garden though despite what Wikipedia may say.

Congratulations to the winners of the mixed up words competition

Last week I wrote a thing demonstrating how people could still read mixed up text and promised a prize for the first student to return the message to me unscrambled.

Well quite a few of you did it so I extended it to the first six students who responded. The students who are going to receive posh chocolate from this shop in Leighton buzzard in the flavour of their choice are as follows:

Annie Gova
Harriette Lea
Sam Bradley
Sasha Austin-Seade
Sajeda Begum
Lorna Hill

Well done to all.
The winners now need to tell me which flavour of bar they'd like and I'll do the rest. Follow the link above to see the choices.

And a special well done to those who spotted my (ahem) deliberate mistake concerning the word 'sentences'. With that level of scrutiny you'll go far!

New report covering police response to domestic abuse allegations

There seems to have been a rash of reports in the last 12 months covering different aspects of domestic violence.

The latest, published today, is an in depth review of how a selection of police forces have responded to victims. It makes uncomfortable reading for police and victims alike. Whilst the report does highlight pockets of good practice, there was scathing criticism for the vast majority of constabularies.

I'd always encourage you to read original sources over second hand accounts wherever possible (especially if you're going to reference the report obviously) and with that in mind the whole thing can be found here. That said, if you'd prefer a shorter account of what the report says, the BBC has a good mix of video, audio and text here covering the issue.

Let me know if you'd like any help with the strategic reading or referencing of such a document.

New report published on violence towards women

I heard a new report being discussed this morning and I was sort of listening with one ear until I suddenly heard mention of the sample size. Then I started giving it my full attention. The report, which made claims for the amount of violence perpetrated against women was pretty shocking, but as remarkable was that 42, 000 women had been interviewed for the survey. That is a huge sample. I often see published reports where 20 individuals have been interviewed and that isn't unremarkable.

I've suggested to students in the past that sample size is a rough and ready measure of how robust a report's findings might be. Clearly, there are lots of ways that research can be not so good, but when I see exaggerated claims being made for very small scale samples my bad research detector starts going off.

The current research (which looks extremely robust) published by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) reports that roughly half of women in the UK have been victims of physical or sexual abuse. A more detailed breakdown of what the report offers can be found here.

For further details, have a look how the Independent newspaper reported the research from here.

Peer to peer learning

I've always seen it as a sign of self confidence when students say 'I don't know how to do that', whatever the 'that' might be. It takes courage to admit what you lack. The temptation is to bluff it but that isn't really a long term solution. One way forward is through peer to peer learning which is purely a fancy way of saying let's give students the opportunity to learn from each other. 


Many of you do this already but I'm keen to promote it more. One thing I'm trying to increase are the number of teaching sessions which involve students from multiple courses. So what you might find is when you ask me for a one to one teaching session it'll become a one to two instead and include someone else who you may not know. So far these have been really interesting sessions as students have sometimes advised each other on possible solutions to problems without me needing to intervene. And I learn something new in the process.

The best teaching sessions always involve an exchange of ideas, so if you end up taking part in one of these small groups I hope it benefits you.

Journal Articles vs Books: the verdict

Students ask me sometimes if journals are better than books which is rather like asking if rivers are better than mountains; my answer is both have their place, they complement each other and if you're lucky you can experience both simultaneously.

How far you're currently into your course will partly dictate how familiar you are with reading and using journal articles. If you're relatively new to study then you'll probably be using mostly books and if you're currently writing a dissertation then journals should be your main source of reading.

But that somewhat oversimplifies the situation. The reason for this is straightforward-books and journals are both useful throughout your course and need to be used as and when they're required.

Here's an example; if you're a third year currently reading journal articles about a sociological issue related to feminism you need to understand feminist theory. A journal article won't explain that to you in any depth because it'll probably assume you already know enough. So sometimes going back to the books for the underlying theories is absolutely the right thing to do. Similarly, if you're a first year who's looking at journal articles which keep referring to theorists who you've never heard of, then you can't possibly understand what you're reading. In which case find a book chapter on that theorist to help with the background.

So ultimately it comes down to 'do I understand what I'm reading and is it useful for the task in hand?'
I'm currently writing a new Prezi on the benefits of reading so hopefully I'll get the chance to show it to you before too long.

Female Genital Mutilation

Yesterday was an international day of zero tolerance towards Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

I was listening to Woman's Hour and they had an interesting piece on FGM which you can find here. If you want to go straight to it then fast forward 14 minutes in.

The Guardian has also put together a very good page of resources, interviews and information on FGM which is well worth a look. You can find it here.

If you're searching for journal articles on DISCOVER related to this issue remember to try the abbreviated and full three word phrase.
Any other help needed, then just ask.

Critical thinking

Hello.
You may have been 'lucky' enough to see me presenting my talk on critical thinking in the last few days.

I think I've finally got the link to work so you can go through the presentation yourself.
Here it is:

Prezi on critical thinking

There's also a fair few books in the library on the subject.
Try the link below for one of the better ones:

A beginner's guide to critical thinking by Aveyard

I'd be happy to discuss any of the issues associated with thinking critically (even the Latin...), so do contact me if you'd like to know more.

Reminder of my next workshop

Hello.

I'll be in training room 1 (TR1) in the library on Wednesday afternoon from 2pm until 3pm.

You can turn up at any point during the hour and ask me questions about anything you like.
Not geography though, as I'm rubbish at it.

But anything else is fine.