Stuck with your final thesis

For many students, the final project is their first contact with the world of research. The fear of the blank page is multiplied when you reach the last year of college.

#1 Measure your strengths: you have to go deeper but be realistic.

The final thesis is an individual research project on a specific topic, the objective of which is to demonstrate the student's capacity for analysis and reflection. The idea is that the student, guided by a tutor, carries out an in-depth work on a topic that interests him/her, from the many that have been seen in the career. It is done from an academic point of view and has an important research training load.

It is therefore necessary to adapt to the language of research: review the existing literature, set objectives, propose hypotheses, apply a methodology, collect data, explain the results, draw up conclusions... But without forgetting that this is a work of initiation. No revolutionary finding or arduous work of months and months of study is required, so it is necessary to measure forces and be realistic when deciding what to do and how to do it.

#2 Be careful when choosing the topic: if you do not specify it, it is difficult to make progress.

It has to be feasible and, if possible, linked to your interests. But, above all, it has to be concrete.

his ability to focus is valued, but also that you know how to translate your topic into realistic, measurable research objectives, formulated with an infinitive (not as a wish): to evaluate, study, measure, quantify...  A research work always arises from a series of questions and realities that we want to study. A very common mistake is the poor formulation of the objectives; without this step, it will be very difficult to guide the work.

These objectives must also be related to the hypothesis you are proposing, i.e., the possible answer to your initial questions, which you will then have to test positively or negatively with your research.

#3 It's not just another project: dedicate a few hours every day to it.

Final projects are designed as a long-term project. Normally, they are accompanied by tutorials in which the professors in charge of guiding each project ask for partial deliveries to help manage the time. Even so, it is necessary to plan ahead and dedicate a fixed number of hours each day. You also have to hone your self-management skills. And you have to consider the emotional factor: it's long and you're going to go through moments of higher and lower motivation.

#4 Take a trip to the library: Google does not work

The source finding and reading phase is fundamental, because this is where you have to set the basis of your research and the theoretical framework in which you are going to move. But how do you select the bibliography and where do you look for it? Let's start with the easy part, Google does not work, but Google Scholar, the search engine specialized in scientific literature, does. It is also necessary to take one (or more) walk around the university library and consult, in addition to books, the catalogs and electronic databases available.

#5 It's not just about quoting: you have to build your own ideas.

You have to read and show that you have read, yes, but you also have to bring your own vision. Critical, thoughtful and with technical language. It's not just about putting together or copying a series of sentences from other authors. In addition to the quotations, the student has to add information of his or her own.

Tips for taking the best notes in class

Believe it or not, most students don't take notes well. We can do better and with less effort. Want to know how? Read this.

 #1 Try to avoid your laptop

Yes, the computer is great for writing: our notes are always clean, we write faster and have time to transcribe more text, it corrects spelling mistakes, we have them organized in folders and they do not take up physical space, nor get stained with coffee, nor lost, nor misplaced...

It is true, taking notes with the computer has many advantages and few disadvantages, but the few that it has are tremendously important: firstly, by allowing us to have several pages open at the same time, it is a tremendous source of distraction. And secondly, and more important than all of the above, if we are not writing by hand, we are impairing our learning.

#2 Do not copy Power Points

Teachers usually upload their presentations to the teaching platform, so it makes no sense for us to copy what it says (unless the teacher in question says he/she is not going to share it). Although it may seem obvious, the truth is that we often end up copying almost what is said in the presentation and that does not make any sense. A professor's PowerPoint is designed so that we can follow his explanation, but also, and above all, it is his guide so that we do not lose the thread of the class and stick to the syllabus. Therefore, much of what is written there will not be understood at all without the relevant explanation: once we read it at home without the teacher's explanations, we will see that there are many parts that are incomprehensible to us.

 

Therefore, good notes will be based on the teacher's explanations of the presentation, not on the presentation itself. What we should do is to write down what the teacher considers important for each point and simply reference the section of the PowerPoint to which it refers.

#3 Search for relevant explanations

There are professors who tell us directly what will be on the exams and what will not, others leave it in suspense, but all of them are very clear about it. Our mission in taking good notes is to see what is important and what is not. What the teacher focuses on, what stands out the most, what he comes back to... That's what we have to make sure we grasp perfectly. The rest, the anecdotes, the things he skips over, the points that appear in the presentation, but he skips over, are not important and we do not need to copy them unless they serve as an explanation or are linked to some of the main ideas we have seen before. Although they may seem the same, separating main ideas from relevant explanations is very different: the former allows us to take good notes that synthesize the essential content of the syllabus: it helps us to learn. The second allows us to identify what content will be included in the exam: it helps us to pass. And we have already said that they are different things.

#4 Make a code of abbreviations, symbols, or colors.

Abbreviations and acronyms are probably one of the best inventions of note-taking mankind. The time we save by using abbreviations is tremendous and, therefore, we must make our own code.

When we start a career, the are some abbreviations that everybody knows. But when we get to know the vocabulary of our branch of knowledge, we will see that there are a lot of words that are repeated incessantly and that we can shorten. It is advisable to spend some time at home to find these words and make our own code. Once we have it done, we will not forget it and we will save a lot of fatigue to our arm and a lot of time not to stop writing anything that is relevant.

With colors, on the other hand, we must be careful: changing pens while taking notes can waste precious time. Even so, it is good to determine that certain colors or symbols mean that there is a part of the text that is more important than the others in case there is time to be using colors. If we are not those who write at the speed of light, we can always make a line of another color under the text, put an asterisk in red, a yellow arrow ... this will be especially useful for people who have a very developed visual memory; but if it is not our case, we can always make differentiating marks in the same color.

#5 Be organized

The advantage that the computer has over paper or notebooks is precisely that of order. That is why it is very important to follow a series of guidelines so as not to lose any of our work. If we are one of those lucky ones who are disciplined and methodical, we are sure that we will already have folders and binders specifically selected for each subject and that we will keep everything up to date without any problem; but if we are more human and less perfectionist, we may not do so well. So sometimes it's better to invest money in filing cabinets than to be cheap and messy.