Timing the PhD - the Saturday Scholar
How can we incorporate some research time into our day as PhD researchers, without stress? And who is our featured Scholar for today?
I hope the New Year has started off well and smoothly for you - and you had even a little bit of time to do what you like and need over the holidays! It was a quiet one over here for a couple of days in the Loras household (that is my parents and me), with lots of old movies, food, chocolate and naps on the couch : )
And now we are getting back into the swing of things - or trying to, and that’s okay.
I mentioned in one of my older posts that I work as a teacher and student counselor full-time - and I am also doing a PhD in Linguistics at the University of Zurich. I love my PhD, even though it truly is the hardest thing I have ever done. I am learning so much and my supervisors are truly the best.
However, working and doing a PhD at the same time can be rather challenging. As it can be challenging of you have a family to raise, or you are the caregiver of someone, or generally if you have a huge responsibility alongside your PhD.
A little trick I have to motivate me to incorporate research time into the day. It doesn’t always work, but under the circumstances, I try really hard. Here is what I do from the post I wrote a few months ago:
On weekdays, I have some free slots throughout the day, as usually my private lessons are spread from the morning until the evening, in order to accommodate my students and the times and days that are convenient for them. A great point here – my students and I are in the exact same situation – we all work and study at the same time, and we discuss this very often and get ideas from each other on how we combine our studies and work.
In those free slots, apart from preparation, grabbing a snack or eating a meal, I also need to fit in some studying. What I do is, as much as I study or write, be it reading an article or writing this newsletter or notes or whatever, I calculate that time in my diary every day – so sometimes in one day I might do one or two hours, another I may do more. If a student cancels, I try to use that time for my PhD or rest. At the end of the week I calculate all the hours and make a weekly total – and at the end of each month I make a monthly total.
At the end of each year, I calculate the hours I did the whole year and I am tempted to compare to the year before; at the end of 2023, I calculated the time I did and thought that in 2024, I can try to do more if possible, but also not feel bad if I cannot.
Some people join study groups, in person or online (look on the internet, there are lots of researchers who do study sessions online!). Some use the Pomodoro method; I sometimes do that but mostly I study as long as I can in the time allowed in my day.
What do you do to incorporate more study time into your day or week? I would be very happy if you share your methods in the comments.
The Saturday Scholar
A couple of weeks ago, I asked on Instagram (feel free to follow the Meet the PhDs account) what people would like to see more of here on the newsletter.
A great researcher I have followed for quite a while, Rahel T. Dires, messaged me that she would like to see the Sunday Scholar again. I used to present a new scholar every Sunday on Instagram stories, but I called it the Sunday Researcher - I loved Rahel’s alliterated title more, and changed the day to Saturday, as the newsletter comes out on this day. Thank you so so much, Rahel!
I think you can guess who our Saturday Scholar is for today - it’s fellow linguist, Rahel! Drawing from her rich bio on her website, she is a freelance Web Designer, Graphic Designer and a Doctoral Researcher in Linguistics at the Department of Languages, University of Helsinki.
Her research aims at a morphological and typological analysis of grammatical number in Cushitic, an Afroasiatic language family. Specifically, she is looking at singulatives (derived noun forms denoting 'one individual' or 'a/one unit') in their grammatical number systems in several Cushitic languages. So interesting!
Please follow her everywhere here! The link takes you to her very rich Linktree, which includes her blog, her YouTube channel, Redbubble account and shop - she creates products with Ethiopian and other languages! Her Instagram account is amazing, she shares landscapes from Finland and not only; recipes, her research and so much more!
Leave a comment with your methods and let’s connect - it’s so great that we can build such a wonderful and supportive community.