Dissertation speed dating
Dr Jessica Clare Hancock
What is the idea?
Students find writing their dissertation intimidating, as it is an isolating process, and also often because they’re not quite sure what the overall focus of their research is. This fun, sociable activity, which is like ‘speed dating’ for students who are writing dissertations or extended projects, allows them to develop a clear articulation of their central thesis, enabling them to gain confidence in their ideas.
Students are paired up, sit in a row of chairs facing each other, and the facilitator tells them to start. One of the pair begins and has two minutes to tell the other person about their idea for their dissertation. The facilitator will signal the end of the two minutes (perhaps with a buzzer) and the other person will then be given two minutes to communicate the focus of their dissertation. After the end of these two minutes, one person from each of the pairs will move to a new pairing, and the process will be repeated.
Why this idea?
Many students find writing their dissertation intimidating (Hill et al, 2011; Huang, 2007) – it is often the first time they have undertaken research, or produced such a long piece of writing. Two key issues within the dissertation period are 1) the difficulty in keeping research focused to a central idea (Anderson et al, 2006) and 2) the isolated nature of this work (Manathunga & Goozee, 2007) which is often carried out with limited contact with a supervisor, and no group classes enabling peer support. The benefits, of an active-learning, group-based approach, are combating some of the loneliness experienced during a dissertation period, as well as enabling students to move away from just solo writing, into verbal discussion which can result in a different approach to their work. Talking through their dissertation with others provides the vital opportunity to practice, learning through making mistakes in their summaries, in a much lower-stake environment than with their supervisor – it thus includes elements of ‘doing’, ‘making sense’ and ‘feedback’ which have been suggested by Race (2014) as crucial to learning.
To address the first problem, a repeated articulation of a student’s research idea within a time limit means that their ideas become more concrete and more coherent. Being asked to provide an overview of their research several times means that each student becomes more confident about its key focus, and can identify areas needing further exploration or increase their awareness of how to structure their ideas. Often students’ initial reactions to their first few turns are that the time went really quickly, and they didn’t manage to mention a particular aspect, or they realised that they had left out a main point after the buzzer went. As the activity continues, students are able to provide a more concise version of their idea, leaving out extraneous material and concentrating on the crux of the matter – perhaps their central que