Comments on: Monday Master Class: How Two Extra Hours Can Make Your Paper Two Times Better

By: Taylor O'Connor

Taylor O'Connor — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 18:38:10 +0000

This article makes perfect sense. It’s easy for us as students to get a pessimistic attitude about our writing papers and essays when we do countless papers on things we personally aren’t interested in, but thats part of learning. It’s all about personal growth as an individual, to ask yourself hard and honest questions about the subjects given to us in school. I really enjoyed this topic and the way it was written because it inspires me to really look deeper into my ideas as a student, and as a person.

By: NL

NL — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 01:49:43 +0000

I’ve been agonizing over papers for years, except once. After working for a few hours and realizing I didn’t want to write, I decided to go to sleep for the night instead. I sprang out of bed in the morning with a thesis and an outline, ready to go. I got an “A” on that one.

By: susansimon

susansimon — Thu, 21 May 2009 16:46:37 +0000

Nice photo to illustrate your point!

By: Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Monday Master Class: The Paperback Writer Method

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 13:24:43 +0000

[...] a lot of this time not just writing, but also thinking — thinking hard about what you’re saying, why you’re saying it, and what would be [...]

By: Jesse

Jesse — Fri, 09 May 2008 17:43:40 +0000

This is excellent advice.

One of my most rewarding courses in college was a philosophy course. Most of the grade came from several “short papers”: they had no required length and if we could answer the question in ten words, we were permitted to do so. This forced students to sit down and parse out what did and did not matter; the professor would take off for extraneous garbage, since length was not a requirement.

I ended up producing some of my best undergraduate work during that time.

For other short papers, I actually treated drafts as drafts and went back to totally rewrite (i.e. starting with a brand new document) a paper a few times. This helps you hold on to the stuff that really matters through each iteration, but helps you sort through the unnecessary stuff.

By: Ramit Sethi

Ramit Sethi — Mon, 05 May 2008 22:23:09 +0000

This is perhaps the best advice about writing that I have ever read. And it works — I’ve used this very technique to write my book. As usual, whether with programming or writing or marketing, most of the real work is behind the scenes.

By: Study Hacks

Study Hacks — Mon, 05 May 2008 21:21:57 +0000

@Chris:

Good point. Another example: I wrote 17 pages of a major research paper today. What that hides is the three weeks of both building my paper research database and generally just punching around, and discussing, and grappling with, and trying to make sense of what I wanted to say. Today was just typing.

By: Chris Yeh

Chris Yeh — Mon, 05 May 2008 20:29:41 +0000

It’s far easier to make fundamental changes to a paper when it only exists in your mind. Only when you’ve worked out the basic outline should you sit down and start writing.

I once managed to write a mid-term paper for an English class in less than 2 hours, counting from the time I started reading the topic material (I was fortunate in that the subject was a pair of short stories) to the time I completed the 1,000 word essay. And yes, I did get an A+.

By: Michael | University Scholar

Michael | University Scholar — Mon, 05 May 2008 15:15:29 +0000

“take your readings and go for a walk”

I concur. I do this all of the time. The great thing is when you sit down to write your paper, it’s almost done(at least in your head).