What advice would I now give to someone writing his/her first scientific paper?

There is several words of advice that I would give someone who is writing their first scientific paper.Such as:

• The first being start on your papers early and do as much research as possible. It is better to have more information than you need rather than not having enough to support all the ideas you wish to cover.

• Put allot of thought in the direction and point you want to make with your paper early on that way you can focus on the right type of information.

• Be sure to have enough scientific information to be able to back up the point you are trying to argue. If you do not have enough it will not come across as a professional paper.

• Always keep an open mind when you are getting peer and professor reviews. Sometimes a fresh set of eyes can give you a great view or may see mistakes that you do not. It is always a great thing to get another persons take on your paper. This way you can see if it makes sense to others like it does to you.

• Be sure you know how to recite your references in APA format. If you do not make sure you ask.

•  Lastly, do not wait until the last minute to submit your paper because you never know what can go wrong. I learnt that first hand and my laptop crashed so I had to submit my paper late.

This class is very informative and will teach you allot about becoming a good writer and how to write a great paper. Just be sure to keep an open mind!

Do I feel nervous, accomplished, or just plain tired?

I would have to say with my paper being almost done I feel nervous, accomplished, and just plain tired! I am nervous because I do not know what others will think about my paper and I am not sure that I did it right. I can say that I never feel truly confident of my writing and will continue to be nervous until I get my grade for my paper back. However, I think it would be hard not to feel accomplished with all the research, writing, and revision that I have put into this paper. I believe that it is a huge accomplishment to write a paper of any kind. Who isn't tired when they go through normal everyday life and then have school to do on top of? I for one am very tired and am looking forward to the week off that we get. But I know that even though I am tired and seem burnt out that it will all be worth it in the end when I get my degree. That will make all the late nights and rushing worth it. I just need to keep my eyes on the prize!
When I feel overwhelmed or stressed out I just keep thinking how it good I will feel in the end when I can say I did!

Will I Go On With My Blog

I would have to sadly say that I will not continue on with writing on my blog after this class is over. I just don't think that blogging is my cup of tea. Then again it could be that I really didn't get much feedback to make me want to go on. Then again I didn't give much feedback to others so I guess you get what you give.

Peer Reviews.....

How do I feel about peer reviews? I would have to say I like them. I say this because it is always good to have a "fresh set of eyes" looking at my paper. I like getting feed back on how others think I could improve my paper and keep it on track. To me the peer review has been very helpful and insight full.

The Path of the Last Six Weeks...

What have I personally been dealing with the last six weeks? Where do I start? In the last six weeks I have had knee surgery, the flu has hit everyone in my home, and I am taking my CPC courses through the AAPC on top of my three classes I have this term. So between my children, my husband, taking care of the house, and school my time is all accounted for.

One thing that I have found is that once you get off track it is hard to get back on. It just seems like when I feel like I am getting ahead something happens and I am playing catch up for the week. I have also found that I am not good at test taking. I can study my booty off and still I do not do as well as I should. I do not know why this is either. I get so frustrated with myself and I don’t know what to do.

However, no matter what happens I moved forward and do the best I can. I know that in the end it will all pay off!

What Do I Think......

My personal writing process is up in the air. What I mean by this is I do my research and get the information that I want to you and then I either sit at my computer or I sit down with a pen and paper and just write. I feel that I am able to be more creative by doing it this way rather than planning out each sentence or paragraph beforehand.  I know that this may seem odd to some of you but it seems to work for me. After I get done writing I put it away and come back to it later to reread it and make any changes that I see need to be made. This is how I write.

As far as any academic challenges that I have it would have to be this term. I am taking three classes and they are English Comp 2, A and P 2, and Fundamentals of Health Information. The problem that I have run into is the holiday break threw me off, I had surgery, and the flu has hit my house. I just seem to be more stressed and not doing well in A and P 2 and Fundamentals of Health Information. I stress that I may not pass one or both and I have no clue what the lowest grade is that you can get before having to retake a class which stresses me out more.

School has been a positive, stressful, educational, uplifting experience in my life up to this point. I love every minute of being back in school even if I do feel like pulling my hair out at times. I just keep in mind that I will be done before long and that I can then lead my children by example and encourage them to do well in school and further their education when the time comes. Now mind you my kids are 1 and 2 so that time is far off. However, they are the reason I have pushed myself so hard. Well them and my husband. So I would say school has been pretty good.

Thoughts About Plagiarism

I think that the reason we need to cite our sources to give credit where credit is due. If we do not cite our sources we are taking credit for ideals that we did not come up with and information we did not do the research for.

What would I do if someone used something I created without giving me credit? Well, I am assuming that this question would have to do with someone I know in order for me to find out about so I would say I would probably be angry and would have to confront them about it.

Real world professional plagiarism I believe should not be tolerated. I believe if you out right steal someone else’s work you should lose your job. Not to mention the respect that you will lose from others and I am sure you would lose respect for yourself or at least you should.

I would have to say yes the Internet does blur the line of “legally owned”. I say this because you can find anything on the Internet and copy and paste it to seem like your own. That also includes pictures. Lets use facebook as an example; you post pictures on facebook and people tag your picture so they can have it too. Well the picture may have started out to be your but now everyone else has. The same could go for a statues update. You may post a statues update and some likes it and they copy and paste it to their statues without giving you credit.  But because it is the Internet do you “own” that statues?

My Feelings Being An Online Student

I am very happy about being an online student at Kaplan. I have always wanted to further my education but was not sure if I would ever be able to afford to do so nor if I would ever have the time. After doing some research and talking to the personnel at Kaplan I am was assured that I would be able to accomplish my goal. I am now in my fourth term and fifth term and have loved every minute of it. I am able to go at my take my time, go at my own pace, as well as attend classes at different times. The flexibility is the best thing due to the fact that I have two small children and am very busy. I do miss not being able to put faces with names and sometimes miss being in a traditional learning environment because of this. However, because of so many people putting their pictures on their blog spot it makes it easier.
I would recommend online learning to anyone that is considering going back to school!