Daily viva help for PhDs
At your viva will you face your examiners? Will they confront you with questions? And will you challenge their comments or criticisms? In that small group will you talk or debate or discuss? Do you have to answer every question? Or will you feel more comfortable as...
Viva prep doesn’t cost you twenty or thirty hours. You don’t simply spend all those hours on a task. You invest your time to be ready. You invest your time in preparation to create a better situation in your viva...
What kind of speaking are you expecting to do in your viva? Do you imagine you’ll have to explain what you did? Do you think you’ll simply expand on what you’ve done? Or perhaps you think you will explore what...
The viva is framed in lots of different ways. It’s an exam. It’s a test. It’s a discussion. It’s the end of the PhD journey or the final challenge. You could be excited to be there or telling yourself, “Let’s...
Expectations for the viva are not guarantees but they matter because they show the process at work. Expectations help because they give a platform for preparation. Vivas vary in length, but knowing roughly what to expect helps to prepare for the...
The viva is a conversation. The viva is a test. The viva is the end of the PhD. The viva is pass or fail. The viva is inevitable. The viva is something you can prepare for. The viva is an...
When you think ahead to it, how do you describe your viva? Do you feel it will be a challenge? Do you joke that your examiners will give you a grilling? Do you find thinking about your viva a bit...
I hear a lot of people describe vivas in binary terms. The viva is long or short. Either you’ll love it or hate it. Expect examiners to be fair or critical. Questions are either easy or hard. Preparation is straight-forward...
You will survive – manage to keep going in difficult circumstances – because you’ve done that throughout your PhD. You will most likely thrive too – grow, develop and be successful. Prepare rather than perfect. You can get ready for the conversation...
People use lots of names to describe the PhD viva. Viva voce. Thesis defence. Final viva. Thesis examination. The viva. It’s quite common, in my experience, for candidates to capitalise the V in viva! “…my Viva is next month…” Words matter....