Learn practical lessons about confidently writing & completing each section of the most important document in your study
What you'll learn
- A complete overview of all the main sections that you will need to write in your thesis and what goes in each one
- How to stay on track by structuring your document effectively and working in parallel on the sections
- Planning your postgraduate degree to maximise the time and effort you put into your dissertation
- How the final report brings your whole study together and presents it to your examiners with your supervisor's approval
- The main sections: Introduction, Literature Review, Methodology, Results / Findings, Discussion / Conclusion
- Front matter (table of contents, figures, abstract) and back matter (list of references, appendices)
- What goes into an introduction to bridge the world of the reader with your detailed research
- Key concepts, problem statement, research questions, hypothesis, motivation and objectives of a postgraduate study
- How the literature review section describes the landscape of relevant research and how you must show you've engaged it
- Intersecting lines of inquiry which overlap like a Venn diagram in your literature review to show the gap you are studying
- The methodology section and how you must position yourself philosophically before entering the field
- Research philosophies using the famous Saunder's onion model and how they impact your approach to choosing a methodology
- The difference between inductive, abductive and deductive theory development and how this affects your results section
- Methodological choices such as mixed methods, quantitative, qualitative, action research, ethnography etc
- Research strategies such as experimental, action research, ethnography and case study
- Your results chapter and how to approach it depending on your methodological choice
- The importance of a framework to help present your results in a meaningful way for your reader
- Moving from "what?" in your results section to "so what?" and "now what?" in your discussion and conclusion
- How to approach the implications, application, limitations and contribution of your study
- The importance of recommending future work that can build on your own study and drive further contributions
Requirements
- There are no course requirements or prerequisites
Description
"This is such a great course. I am glad that I got to do it this early in my thesis (I am now doing my literature review chapter). I have enough time to start implementing all that Peter has taught. This course is suitable for everyone doing their masters or PhD irrespective of their stage in their research. Thanks Peter!" - Sindi Amunga
"This course is just 'what the doctor ordered' for me at this point. A perfect match for my needs. I just got a clear picture of how I can knit up and shape the piles of material I had all over the show. The simple and clear explanations, illustrations and demonstrations cleared up my understanding of thesis report writing. I clearly understand how to place myself as a researcher in my study, and I feel confident to justify my own choices of research methodology. I would recommend this course any day to both novice and veteran researchers for a simplified, easy to understand and practical approach to thesis research writing." - Aretha Maposa
In this course you will learn everything you need to know to write and complete the final document of your postgraduate level, research study. It is often called a thesis, dissertation or final report and although there might be variations across faculties, the main structure is always the same. Each section of this course corresponds to a section in your thesis, in which you learn how to approach it, what goes in it and what's important about completing it to achieve success. Each section also contains a demonstration lesson of each section from my own PhD, which shows you the application of the lessons. There are worksheets for you to download as reference guides for each section as well as quizzes and whiteboard lessons. Regardless of what phase you are in, this course will give you the overview and guidance that you need to gain confidence that you can complete your dissertation without stress, on time and achieve a pass mark. What I teach you in this course is exactly what I learnt doing my own PhD, often the hard way; this is the course I wish I could have done when I was doing my document. I've created and packaged it in precisely the way that I would have found the most valuable - it truly takes a successful postgraduate student to teach another one about what they need to do.
Exactly what is in this course:
- An introductory lesson and "whiteboard webinar" teaching you about doing your final report, thesis or dissertation
- Worksheets for the introduction, literature review, methodology section. results, conclusion / discussion and front / back matter
- Lessons and demonstration lessons from my own PhD for each section, explaining what goes into them and how to write them successfully
- Quizzes for each section of your document to test your learning about what goes in each and how you should approach them
- A demonstration lesson of the front and back matter from my own PhD showing exactly how I laid them out and made extensive use of appendices
- A whiteboard lesson about how to plan the last six months of your postgraduate degree during which you will write and complete your report
Who this course is for:
- Diploma, under-graduate and postgraduate students
- Anyone who has to write a thesis or dissertation / final report
