ISTE Workshop Writing Effective Conference Papers

Organizing and Planning Paper Part II

Sahana Murthy IIT Bombay

IIT Bombay Feb. 18, 2012

Goal of this session

1) 2) Start from your idea. Plan a research paper based on your idea by using Guidelines on effective research paper writing. Organize the paper into Title, Abstract, Intro, Sections etc

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Logistics of this session

What I will do: Provide a template for planning your paper. Take you through the process slide-by-slide. What you have to do: Write answers to questions What you need: Paper, pen, and focus.
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Mini-homework reminder
Think of one innovative teaching strategy you have used. Write this idea in 2-3 sentences in your notebook. If you have done the HW, great! Begin with it. If you have not done the HW, pair with someone who has 2 min!

Paper Planning Template

Approach
There are 5 sections in this template: 0. Jot down your idea I. Setup the problem II. Explain your solution III. Defend your solution IV. Explain your solution Note that these sections are not necessarily the sections of the final paper These sections will help you to get your ideas and into a logical sequence so that you can begin to write the paper
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What are you supposed to do?

White slides contain questions you need to answer, instructions you need to follow and points to guide your thinking. Blue box - Write bullets in the blue box for each slide to answer the question posed as that slide's title Yellow slides contain illustrative example (already filled) to guide you

0. Jot down your idea

What is your overall idea?

Instruction: Jot your ideas about the work that you already did. Distance education is becoming popular but students show mixed reaction. Distance education classrooms have limited interactivity. This can be improved by student response systems or clickers. We developed technology to implement clickers in a distance education context and used it in a workshop.
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What is your overall idea?

Instruction: Jot your ideas about the work that you already did.
DONE from yesterdays mini-HW

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I. Setup the problem

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Why setup the problem?

You may have done some work. Merely describing it is not sufficient to make it into a research article. You need to think about the context, usefulness, and rigor of your work. You need to think about other similar work that you will compare with. If you do not sell your problem well, the referee will not buy your solution.

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1. What is the main concept underlying your work?

Instructions: i) Illustrate the concept and its applications with an example, to give an intuitive idea. ii) Then give a formal definition of the concept from literature. EXAMPLE Improving interactivity in teaching. For example, in face-to-face classes, the kinds of interactivity a teacher can ask a question, judge students body language (e.g. bored expression), get and give real time feedback. Interactivity in a classroom could be between teacher-student, student-student, student-instructional materials, and studenttechnology and so on.
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1. What is the main concept underlying your work?

Instructions: i) Illustrate the concept and its applications with an example, to give an intuitive idea. ii) Then give a formal definition of the concept from literature.

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2. Why is your work important?

Instructions. Answer: i) Why is your work important? Justify from literature, not just your feelings. ii) Who requires your work (who is target audience)? EXAMPLE Many universities are starting distance education programs to address the problem to providing quality education at low cost. Yet, student perceptions towards distance learning do not show a clear preference for these new modes of learning. One reason for a preference of the in-the-class education over distance education is the limited opportunity for synchronous 15 teacher-student interactivity in a virtual environment.

2. Why is your work important?

Instructions. Answer: i) Why is your work important? Justify from literature, not just your feelings. ii) Who requires your work (who is target audience)?

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3a. What prior work has been done?

Instructions: Write what prior work is relevant to your work. For example: What are traditional ways to solve the problem? Who else has attempted to solve the problem using a technique similar to yours? EXAMPLE 1) Work related to improving interactivity in face to face classes, using technology : Student response systems or clickers 2) Work related to improving interactivity in distance education: Video and audio conferencing with 2-way interactivity. A mouse on every desk by Microsoft Research

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3a. What prior work has been done?

Instructions: Write what prior work is relevant to your work. For example: What are traditional ways to solve the problem? Who else has attempted to solve the problem using a technique similar to yours?

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3b. Analyze related work

Instructions: Identify themes and categorize the related work. Use figures and tables. 1) Clickers shown to be highly effective in face to face classrooms to improve attendance, more active participation in class, increased collaborative activities and better learning. 2) Work related to improving interactivity in distance education: Video and audio conferencing with 2-way interactivity. Benefits visual cues possible, feels like real interaction Drawbacks Cumbersome to use, instructor cannot judge if students are following lecture A mouse on every desk by Microsoft Research Benefits highly interactive 19 Drawbacks expensive

3b. Analyze related work

Instructions: Identify themes and categorize the related work. Use figures and tables.

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4. What are the current pain points?

Instructions: Identify problems in existing solutions, gaps not addressed . Write how do you think your work can address above problems or gaps in existing work? EXAMPLE 1) In most current solutions aimed at diminishing the physical gap between the instructor and the students in the virtual classroom, the instructor does not have sufficient means to gauge the comprehension level of the class in real-time. 2) Another serious consequence is that students miss out on peer discussion and dialogue with the instructor as compared to the conventional classroom
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No one has used clickers in distance education so far.

4. What are the current pain points?

Instructions: Identify problems in existing solutions, gaps not addressed . Write how do you think your work can address above problems or gaps in existing work?

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5. What is your problem?

Instructions:Phrase your problem as questions Avoid phrasing as sentences.

Broad level What is the procedure by which one can embrace the implementation and benefits of clickers for distance education? Specific questions What modifications need to be done, in terms of development of new technologies pedagogical strategies to use clickers in distance education? What are the challenges in using clickers in distance 23 education?

5. What is your problem?

Instructions:Phrase your problem as questions Avoid phrasing as sentences.

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Check
At this point the reader should be convinced of: Your problem is important Reading about your technique may be interesting (because it is novel or effective or easy-to-implement )

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II. Explain your solution

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What is your solution approach?

Instructions: Describe your overall approach Describe what you will write for the details. (You need not write all the details here itself) The instructor delivered lectures from a central location, which were transmitted to remote classrooms. RCs were equipped with receivers which communicate to a server located in the central classroom over the internet. Participants respond to questions presented by the instructor through clickers. Here I will show a block diagram of the distributed system set up and the architecture. I will show a flow diagram of the process of asking questions, 27 and collecting and comparing answers.

What is your solution approach?

Instructions: Describe your overall approach Describe what you will write for the details. (You need not write all the details here itself)

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Why is your method likely to work?

Instruction: Defend your approach using logical arguments. Argue that the steps are: Sound (in some logical order) Complete (cover all aspects of your problem) Necessary (directly target solution) Sufficient (no critical step has been omitted)

EXAMPLE Clickers have been highly successful in face to face classrooms, hence likely to succeed in distance mode too . Technology has already been shown to work in distance mode between two locations, hence we do not expect probelms. We collect data to check if our solution was effective.

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Why is your method likely to work*?

Instruction: Defend your approach using logical arguments. Argue that the steps are: Sound (in some logical order) Complete (cover all aspects of your problem) Necessary (directly target solution) Sufficient (no critical step has been omitted)

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What are the limits to your method?

Instructions: State the boundaries (scope) in which you are working. Identify and state all assumptions that you are making. Justify why it is okay to make these assumptions. Scope: Tested so far with only one workshop in which instructor is very familiar with clicker use and technology Assumptions: Participants actually use the clickers in the time allotted Remote centres have manpower to solve technical problems if they arise. In order to address this, our team visited RCs and trained technical staff. 31

What are the limits to your method*?

Instructions: State the boundaries (scope) in which you are working. Identify and state all assumptions that you are making. Justify why it is okay to make these assumptions.

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Check for consistency

At this stage, check that the solution you have explained in fact answers the questions you have posed in the slide What is your problem. The solution you just explained must also be consistent with your 'idea' in section 0

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3. Defend your solution (Why should the reader believe you)

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What evidence will you provide?

Instruction Describe what evidence you will provide experiment, analysis, proof, etc to defend your solution Describe the methods you used to generate the evidence

I will collect data of how many participants clicker responses were recorded, for each question over 15 days. I will analyze data of 30 such questions from 500 participants. I will collect and analyze Instructor and participant feedback on distributed clicker system
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What evidence will you provide*?

Instruction Describe what evidence you will provide experiment, analysis, proof, etc to defend your solution Describe the methods you used to generate the evidence

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What are your results*?

Instructions: Write what findings are you going to include here. Write in what format will you report each finding that make them: i) easy to understand, and ii) highlight significant findings. (Use graphs & tables)

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Organize your paper

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What are your key contributions?

Instructions: Identify what knowledge is your paper contributing to the community Recall a paper is not simply a report of what you did, what you found. What are the points that you should highlight ? Everything that you did is NOT worth highlighting. Identify the key points (1 or 2) that you want the reader to note!

We provide the architecture of implementing a distributed student response system We describe the pedagogical process of using clickers in a distributed distance learning environment and show proof-of-concept

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What are your key contributions?

Instructions: Identify what knowledge is your paper contributing to the community Recall a paper is not simply a report of what you did, what you found. What are the points that you should highlight ? Everything that you did is NOT worth highlighting. Identify the key points (1 or 2) that you want the reader to note!

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What is the title?

Do NOT just pick any title
The title should capture those aspects of your paper that you want to highlight (see previous slide). Consider titles that are too broad and too specific and then decide the 'about-right' level; Then refine the 'about-right' level to generate the 3-4 options. The title should attract the reader but still be professional

Title:
Option 1: Option 2: Option 3:
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What is the title?

Using clickers in distance education (too broad) Design of an open-source student response systems based on XX architecture for distributed setup in distance education (key contribution not clear, too many specific details) Design and deployment of clickers in a distance education scenario (right level, captures key contributions) Clicking away the distance from education (captures key contributions, but may sound too cute)
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What is the title?

Do NOT just pick any title
The title should capture those aspects of your paper that you want to highlight (see previous slide). Consider titles that are too broad and too specific and then decide the 'about-right' level; Then refine the 'about-right' level to generate the 3 options above. The title should attract the reader but still be professional

Title:
Option 1: Option 2: Option 3: YOUR TITLES:
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What is the abstract?

Revisit slides from sections 1 (problem set-up), 2 (explain solution) and 3 (defend solution) Decide what are the crucial points. For ex: the central problem, new tool/ strategy, comparison you did between your method and old methods, fantastic results (if any). Revisit key contribution slide Must include - key contributions, claims How much to include depends on abstract length?
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Revisit title and key contributions

TITLE: Design and deployment of clickers in a distance education scenario

We provide the architecture of implementing a distributed student response system We describe the pedagogical process of using clickers in a distributed distance learning environment and show proof-ofconcept
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What is the abstract?

Distance education suffers from a lack of real-time interactivity between the instructor and students. We adapt the successful technique of using clickers in face-to-face classrooms to the distance learning environment. We designed a distributed architecture for implementing clickers in simultaneous multiple remote classrooms. We report on a pilot implementation in 23 remote classrooms, and discuss challenges and possible solutions. 4 sentences, 60 words 46

What is the introduction?

This should be brief AND complete
starting with setup of the problem, outlining the solution, to making claims about your results.

Revisit all the points that you have noted for the previous sections in this PPT
Identify which ones are you going to include in the Intro. Ensure that the points in your intro have a logical flow.
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What are the other sections?

What sections will you create in your paper?
What are the section titles? What are the sub-sections? What are the points (from this PPT) that you are going to make in each sub-section? Have any points been missed out?

Revisit ALL these slides to ensure that your paper has a logical flow (according to you).
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What next?

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Apply good practices

Read! Write a first draft (use template) Iterate , improve (use guidelines from this workshop) Give your draft to a colleague. Ask specifically what you would like her/him to check (spelling? flow? )

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Homework 1 Revise your draft

SELF-ASSESSMENT EXERCISE Recall yesterdays activity on identifying the purpose of each paragraph in a paper. Repeat the exercise on your draft. Check if any important characteristic(s) of a research paper is missing. If so, make a note of which for example, are the research questions clearly stated? Check if you have followed the guidelines of a typical research paper . If not, note down which for example, have you explained why your problem is important.

Check if the purposes you have listed in 1) follow a coherent sequence. Use your responses to 1), 2), 3) and decide how you have to revise the list in 1) 51

HW 2: Idea

Outline for research paper

1) Complete the slides in the template for your idea. This will form the outline of your research paper. (please download newer version of template from Moodle ). 2) Upload your outline (the slides) on Moodle 3) Give feedback to fellow participants

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With sincere thanks to

E-outreach team For the superb technical support, making sure that the teaching-learning process goes on seamlessly Mukta Atrey Kalpana Kannan D.B. Phatak Anura Kenkre Gargi Banerjee Mrinal Patwardhan Anita Diwakar Sridhar Iyer D.B. Phatak Kannan Moudgalya U.N. Gaitonde R.B. Sunoj Workshop, RC coordinators Participants each of the 2835+ of you

For running, organizing, and conceiving this large scale effort

For help and suggestions in creating instructional materials, activities

For sharing their knowledge, wisdom with all of us

For running the show in the real classrooms, valuable bridge For sincere and enthusiastic participation
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What next ? Lunch!

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