The most useful textbook & academic writing posts of the week: Holiday Edition, Part 1
This week’s most useful blog post takes a look at some of the most popular articles featured in this weekly series. This is Part 1 of a two-part series. Next week will also focus on popular posts from this past year that were featured here. I hope you have a wonderful holiday spent with loved ones, eggnog and cookies, and writing that flows easily on to the page! For more wishes for writers this holiday season, read this and this.
How to prepare for your (shudder) doctoral dissertation defense
Most universities require a final doctoral defense of your precious work. Almost everyone who has a doctorate has a final defense story. Often they are the worst horror stories one can imagine, short of a bedroom intruder, and emblazoned on the mind of the teller forever.
For example . . . A friend of mine was obviously pregnant at her defense. After she successfully passed, her chair, staring at her bulk, informed her with a tone of incontrovertibility that her entire graduate education had been a “waste.” Outrageous, I know. I’m very glad to say she proved the chair wrong. Later, with two kids, she became an award-winning professor at Brandeis.
The most useful textbook & academic writing posts of the week: December 18, 2015
The end of the semester has arrived. It’s time to reflect, reassess, and keep moving your writing projects forward. Have…
Why vision boards work and why you should make one today [for authors]
Visualization is a powerful tool. Athletes have harnessed this power for decades. In fact, visualization stimulates the same regions of the brain as actually performing the action does. This powerful tool, however, isn’t just for athletes. Writers too, can benefit from it. One way to do this, and express your creative self while doing so, is to create a vision board. A vision board is literally a board of some kind that you display images on to help you concentrate and maintain focus on a specific life goal (or goals) you have.
How to successfully incorporate text, pictures and audio into your learning materials
Incorporating multimedia resources into learning materials is now standard practice, but according to Laura Frost, Director of the Whitaker Center for STEM Education and chemistry professor at Florida Gulf Coast University, it is important that educators incorporate text, pictures, and audio in ways that will be most useful for learners. Frost is also author of the textbook General, Organic, and Biological Chemistry 2e (Pearson).