Keep Your Writing On Track

STUDENT SERVICES

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JANUARY – JUNE 2018

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1 8 INTE RACTI VE F R EE WO RKS HO PS TO M A K E YO U R WRI TI NG BET T E R T H AN E VE R! STUDY SKILLS CENTRE HELPING YOU GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR STUDIES

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STUDY SKILLS CENTRE HELPING YOU GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR STUDIES

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STUDENT SERVICES

The Study Skills Centre has designed two workshop programmes for Semester Two: Being Critical workshops focusing upon assignment-related tasks, and Great Dissertation workshops exploring strategies to enable you to approach your research.

JANUARY – JUNE 2018 /BU Study Skills Centre

@studyskills_BU

LENGTH: 2 HOURS

Our workshops provide an opportunity to explore practices and strategies that help to develop your understanding of academic expectations and to improve the quality of the work that you produce.

Conversation is central to our approach, and the workshops are task-based, enabling you to learn by doing and questioning.

You are welcome to follow the complete programme, or to opt in only for those sessions that appeal to you.

We look forward to working with you.

THE WORKSHOPS ARE FREE AND PLACES CAN BE RESERVED ONLINE BANGOR.AC.UK/STUDYSKILLS For an outline of the content of each workshop and to book your place, go online to: http://studyskills.bangor.ac.uk/workshops.php.en

Aimed primarily at undergraduates, but also of relevance to postgraduates, this series provides a hands-on opportunity to explore issues central to university level study.

Approaching topics such as the management of your studies, the use of source material, and critical approaches to reading and writing, and discussing ways of generating and organising your ideas, the series aims to provide a sound foundation for approaching future assignments.

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BANGOR.AC.UK/STUDYSKILLS

24th January Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

BE CRITICAL Does the feedback from your lecturers suggests that you need to be more critical? This workshop will introduce the concept of critical thinking and its importance in university level writing. We will explore and practice techniques to develop your critical thinking and apply it in your work.

31st January BEING CRITICAL

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

MAKE THE MOST OF YOUR LECTURES Lectures are sources of valuable information, and ensuring that you fully engage with them will improve your learning experience. In this workshop, we will explore ways of taking meaningful notes and methods of organising your ideas to help plan and structure your writing. If you struggle to make the best use of notes for writing and revision, then come along.

7th February Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

TACKLING ESSAY QUESTIONS Not sure what your assignment question is getting at? Not sure how to structure your work? This workshop focuses upon techniques for analysing assignment briefs and for creating a skeleton structure for your essay.

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This workshop focuses upon gathering material for your writing. We consider how to select sources, how to read with a purpose, and techniques for taking usable notes.

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Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

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14th February

21st February Wednesday | 13.00 – 16.00

WRITE BETTER SENTENCES This workshop will explore practical ways to editing out common errors in sentence construction, language and logical flow found in your writing.

The session should be of interest if feedback from your lecturers suggests that you need to polish your punctuation, grammar or language.

28th February Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

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PARAPHRASING & AVOIDING PLAGIARISM

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This workshop investigates what constitutes good practice when expressing and referencing the ideas of other writers, and offers a number of methods for avoiding plagiarism.

7th March Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

MAKING YOUR ARGUMENT STRONGER This workshop considers what makes an academic argument, and explores how counter-arguments can be used to strengthen your own position and bolster your claims.

14th March Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

RE-DRAFTING ESSAYS BANGOR UNIVERSITY

This workshop will explore practical ways to editing out common errors in sentence construction, language and logical flow found in your writing.

The session should be of interest if feedback from your lecturers suggests that you need to polish your punctuation, grammar or language.

21st March Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

PRESENTING WITH CONFIDENCE This workshop considers how to structure a presentation and to create a list of steps to help get your message across. There will be an opportunity to record quick-fire presentations, and to reflect on your own delivery technique.

Aimed at students who are thinking ahead towards their dissertation and at those who are engaged in preliminary background research, this series provides a hands-on opportunity to: Develop your research goals and proposal Assess your research management Consider how to approach your literature review Shape an abstract Explore what makes a purposeful introduction Consider possible solutions and reflect on your progress.

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25th January Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

POSTGRADUATE STUDY SUCCESS This workshop is aimed at people who are new to postgraduate study and focuses on active learning, referencing and developing a critical response to research, thinking, reading and writing.

1st February

18th April

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

STUDY SKILLS CENTRE

G R E AT D I S S E R TAT I O N S

DEFINING YOUR TOPIC Is your research aim achievable, and what are the merits of pursuing it?

These are two questions that this workshop considers, as we work through the process of generating a research question from an initial topic choice.

8th February

25th April

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

PLANNING YOUR DISSERTATION This workshop explores the notion of a ‘research audit’ as a means of identifying the stages that you will need to work through in order to successfully manage your research project to completion.

15th February

2nd May

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

REVIEWING THE LITERATURE In this workshop we explore the purpose of literature reviews and consider how the review is located within your research. We consider also how to shape an authoritative stance towards the literature and how to organise your review to maximum effect.

22nd February

9th May

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

RESEARCH PROPOSALS BANGOR UNIVERSITY

What makes a good research proposal? This workshop aims to answer this question through discussion of what your research topic is about and why it is worth pursuing. We will look at strategies to refine your research question or topic, so that you will be in a better position to write your own proposal.

1st March

16th May

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

WRITING ABSTRACTS What makes a good abstract? This workshop aims to answer this question by comparing abstracts from different disciplines and then drawing conclusions about core features.

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8th March

23rd May

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

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WRITING INTRODUCTIONS

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This workshop explores the function of written introductions and the moves that writers make when introducing their work to their readers.

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15th March

30th May

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

G R E AT D I S S E R TAT I O N S

FINDING ANSWERS TO YOUR RESEARCH QUESTIONS In this workshop we will seek answers to your research questions.

It aims to enable you to respond to the problem in question, to consider how you will go about doing the research, and to explore why it is worth doing and your contribution to the subject.

22nd March

6th June

Thursday | 10.00 – 12.00

Wednesday | 13.00 – 15.00

MAPPING YOUR DISSERTATION This workshop will enable you to reflect upon your dissertation experience to date and upon the challenges that you have encountered. It aims to help you understand where you’re at and to consider how you can build on your strengths.