Summer Goals

Good call, Billie. A little accountability is always useful. I'm going to post some goals here too. First, though, a good friend of mine just got back from doing the same thing in Daytona (AP grading, I mean. Not posting goals on DBC). I wonder if you two ran into each other. So weird.

My husband and I just got back from visiting friends in Pennsylvania and Maryland. We were gone for a week -- a much needed but now panic-inducing vacation. So it's back to work.

Goals for June:
Today I have to do all of the copyedits for the collection of student writing that I, well, edit. I have to send that back to the publisher (a printed camera-ready copy) tomorrow morning.

I'll finish a very rough draft of my invitational rhetoric chapter by July 1st. It's mostly done. I just need to read a bit more and then write a small section on Rogerian rhetoric.

July-August:
I'll have a rough draft of an article done by July 31st.

I'll have a full rough draft of my lit review done by August 14th. I'll also have a second draft of my article by that same date.


I think I'm going to head back home for ten days for my dad's 70th birthday, but I'd also like to have another full chapter draft done before the job list comes out.

I'm not completely sure it's do-able, but these are my goals for the summer.

How's Everyone Doing? Goals for the June?

Wow, it's been almost two weeks since anyone's posted here. How are you all doing? Dissertating? Researching? Vacationing? Procrastinating?

Me? I was going at a good clip until I left for Florida and read 1400 AP Language exams. (A longer post coming at P-n-P tomorrow.) That's right: 1,400 essays. In seven days. The ol' brain cells stopped working each day at 4:45 and I was unable to write, read, think. I walked along the beautiful Daytona Beach shore . . . took some pictures . . . and slept. But I'm home, a little more rested, and ready to get back to work on the dissertation.

I am in dire need of some accountability, so I will make some smallish goals here and will post my results at the end of the day. So tomorrow (Wednesday), I will move back to the Introduction . . . incorporate some feedback I received from a colleague, meet another reader for lunch and receive her comments, and revise as much as I can at this stage. I will also begin a little section for another chapter -- a narrative about a particular student athlete. Since I just read those (largely very poor) AP exams, I'm in the mode of reading student work. I have a sense of comparison now-- between what those students were able to write and what my student was able to write. Yes, I know the contexts are very different and the students were (probably) very different, but it is writing . . . and I think I've got something to say about it all.

What are your goals for the latter half of June? Anything we can help you do?

Anyone Want to Exchange Drafts?

This week I will finalize what I think is my introduction, and I'll send it to a few readers (my writing group and JK, as they are local). Anyone else want in on the fun? Of course we can use this blog to support each other, but perhaps we can support each other in a more tangible way. I'm happy to send my stuff out if anyone would be willing to read and comment. I'd do the same for you. Any question or comments? Please bring 'em on!

A Few Hints and Tricks

Mornin' all!

Over the weekend, I really pushed myself to write. This is key as I tend to "edit" and not "write." As you know, there is a difference. I found a couple of strategies that really helped. I don't remember where I read these (or I'd link to them), but are a few I found:

• I made myself write (without stopping) until I had reached 500 words, and I did this several time throughout the day. These short writing bursts kept me from editing and getting stumped on a 2nd or 3rd sentence, and it allowed me, by the end of the day, to have about 3,000 words written. I found that once I started to write-- and not stop myself to edit-- I could produce work that was fairly decent. I can edit it today, but at least I got something down on paper.
  
  
• I found a nifty little online timer. This is a free download. I can set this timer for 1 minute or 5 minutes or 10 minutes (or whatever), and I have to type until the alarm goes off. A kitchen timer would do the same thing, but kitchen timers make noise, and to me that noise is distracting. The online time is quiet and runs in the background.
  
  
• Lastly, the work I do on my bibliography (in EndNote), the mindmaps I make to help me visualize my data, and research and reading "count" in terms of working on the dissertation. Working doesn't equal (only) writing. So I'm encouraging myself.
  

What hints and tricks do you have that you'd like to share with the rest of us?

A Realization about Writing a Dissertation

After reading Meagan's last post, and after struggling with fears of my own . . . I just buckled down and started to write. It wasn't good writing, but I wrote nonetheless. I wrote about the history of the NCAA, about corruption in collegiate sports, about myths (that aren't really myths) in Division I-A athletics. I wrote about the value of education and how socioeconomic status can factors one's educational preparedness, how race is a part of this, and how high school student-athletes, those who typically need the most help, often have the least experienced teachers. I wrote about 60 pages of work I can't use in this dissertation (at least I can't use it right now).

It took 60 pages of writing to realize that I hadn't written about writing, about the teaching of writing, student writing or anything else that my dissertation is really all about. I got sucked into the machine of college athletics.

That has been the process for me, though. I initially thought I would sit down at the computer and that fairly decent prose would pour out of my body onto the screen or paper. I thought that my writing would be focused and specific because I'd been working at this information for so long. I thought wrong. I think I had to go through the process of writing about these background issues in detail-- in a sense purging them from my mind-- before I could get to the heart of my thesis, the teaching of writing to underprepared student athletes at NCAA-ranked Division I-A institutions.

In a way I feel the time was wasted, but I know it wasn't. That writing time and the pages of prose are important. I can use them later in something else, or I can endnote a bunch of it. If nothing else, it's out of my head so I can focus on the real subject of my dissertation.

Cross posted at PartsnPieces.

if you get a minute...

Mike over at Vitia has posed a question about high-stakes writing. seeing as how a number of us will or have recently sat for our comps, i figured that we all know a thing or two about high-stakes writing...

New to the Boot Camp, But Not to Dissertating

Hi everyone. I took up Billie's suggestion and decided that it would be helpful to post my progress and carouse with the other dissertating soldiers here. I'm in Rhet/Comp and have been developing a rhetorical theory focused on motivating people to intervene by applying psychological studies to rhetoric. Then I examine what this rhetorical theory means in three sites: an activist site, the site of writing for intervention, and the writing classroom.

I was lucky and got a really neat post-doc-type job for next year, so I have to hurry up and graduate in August. I've managed, actually, to turn in second drafts of all the chapters to my advisor. She's gotten me back three chapters, which I'll turn over to my readers this week. It's a crazy process. For a long time I was working and working and working and never feeling like I got anywhere. Then suddenly things were getting done.

My readers have very little time to turn things around. And I've been working crazily every day. In fact, the only reason I sound at all calm right now is that I am ready to send out my chapters to my readers, and my advisor hasn't gotten the other chapters back to me yet. So I'm actually in a lull. For the first time in ages, there's no reading or writing to be done. I could read for fun. I could write a poem. Of course, I'm watching TV. It feels luxurious. I can't wait until this is O-V-E-R.

Good to be here with the other PhreakeD out people!

As the semester winds down

Hi, All.

I hope that you're all finishing up the semester, and it's going smoothly. It's great to see that some are finishing up, too!

I think that the stars have been in alignment for me lately. I did finish my prospectus, defended it, and got it filed. I went through 15 distinct drafts, plus a bunch of smaller changes. My topic is still basically the same, except I've got new research sites, and new data to collect. So, this summer should be very busy--and exciting. Unfortunately, with so little time, I could not come up with a good title for the study, but I can still work on it for the diss. defense, I guess. The new title is "Classical rhetoric as a theoretical lens for understanding multimodal composing practices at four sites of digital composing." I'm still working to bring multimodal studies into conversation with classical rhetoric, and gesture and embodiment will still be important. My revised research questions are:

1. How is the female body constructed in digital multimodal environments?
2. How can a classical rhetorical reading help to account for multimodal composing?
3. What are the limits to constructions of the female body, or representing material bodies in digital multimodal environments?

Thanks to everyone for their support through this, and for sharing examples of your prospectuses, too. Have a great Mother's Day, or at least a nice day off.

I Am, Too

Way to go, elle!

I've just got a little proofreading left.

Here's a few things I found while finishing up.

It's apparently not all that unusual to have a bit of an identity crisis right after you send your dissertation off to your committee. Sort of a "What do I do now? Why did I do this in the first place? What does it all mean? Who am I?" kind of thing.

Along those same lines, it's apparently not all that unusual to feel like you're turning in something incomplete--something that's not as good as it could or should be. You have to remind yourself that it's NOT done, right? This is just a really good draft of your future spectacular book.

Big, big surprise...dissertation defenses don't have to be terrible! Mine was just a really useful conversation with five highly intelligent and talented people who seem to want me to succeed. It was almost...dare I say, pleasant? I think the key is to make sure everyone on your committee is balanced and sane. I have a great advisor whom I trust enormously, and I basically let her decide who should be on the committee. Turned out to be the best move.

Even if the defense goes well, you still manage to find stuff to fret about afterwards--like, did I say something stupid when they took me to lunch afterwards? Did they notice the massive run that appeared in my stockings five minutes before the defense started? Could they tell I was sweating?

All of the anxieties and uncertainties wear away within days after the defense, however, and then you get to bask in the glow of a completed dissertation...at least until the job list comes out.

One last thought...If I can finish a dissertation, anyone can. I'm not kidding. It's nice if you're brilliant (something I've never claimed to be) but the real key is to be persistent.

I Am

PhinisheD!!

Mostly :-)