DR. KATHERINE S. CHO

One of the things that feels hardest about writing is the period of time before putting the thoughts onto paper— or more accurately, the swirling complex tangled knot of all the ideas and things you are thinking that you have to parse out in your head to then even get to the place to start thinking about what goes down onto the paper...

Earlier last year, I got an inquiry from a journal and didn't think much of it. The email felt odd and I trust my instincts so I didn't reply back. (I also happened to be in the thick of data collection so didn't reply to many emails during that season). However, after sleuthing for my advisor on an email inquiry, I stumbled into the world of misleading and potentially predatory journals...

Self reflective questions to ask yourself because writing means knowing yourself and your habits... 

• What time of day do you work best? (The evening? Morning? After 2AM?)
• Where are you most productive? What are the environmental conditions needed for you to be most productive?
• What are you writing goals? (Are they based on finishing an outlined section, meeting a page limits, hitting a word count, etc.?) ​

​When answering these questions, try to think of it outside and away from the times you operated under a deadline. Adrenaline is powerful so people who are usually larks (or early morning workers) can become owls (i.e. late night workers) when a due date is just around the corner~~

I have finished my coursework, so thankfully, I will not be writing (another) class paper any time soon. However, one thing I realized over the course of this year is that class papers and conference proposals differ quite a bit. ​

Here are some lessons learned in how I've translated my class papers to conference papers~