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The Teaching and Learning Unit of Social Sciences > Students' Page

For Students 

The Teaching and Learning Unit of Social Sciences have produced 12 tutorials about study skills such as reading, writing and working in peer groups. They are now available with English subtitles. See them here. 

Individual counselling and supervision

The Educational Centre of Social Sciences offers counselling free of charge to students at the Faculty of Social Sciences who experience academic problems that are not directly related to their academic subject/study programme. We offer individual counselling on methods of study such as:

  • Planning and study habits
  • Reading techniques
  • Structuring written assignments (structure, argumentation etc.)
  • Oral presentation

Call 3532-4534/-4538, send an e-mail to pcs@samf.ku.dk or drop by our office at room 5.1.08 at the Centre for Health and Society and tell us what kind of academic problems you experience. We will then try to help you either by offering workshops, feedback groups or written material, or by scheduling a meeting for individual counselling.

You can read about some of the issues we work with in our guide: ‘Study Skills'.

Feedback Group

The Teaching and Learning Unit of Social Sciences establishes feedback groups for students at the Faculty of Social Sciences who are in the process of writing their Master's theses.

4 or 5 students who study for the same degree and who all are in the process of writing their respective Master's thesis meet every two weeks or so and give each other feedback on their respective drafts. An educational advisor from The Teaching and Learning Unit of Social Sciences is present during the first few meetings.

Please e-mail pcs@samf.ku.dk if you are interested in joining a feedback group.

You can read more about some of Study Group in our guide: "Study Group".

Why

Research and experience show that academic texts produced with input and feedback from others are of a higher quality.
The academic supervisor is, of course, one important source of feedback, but supervisors do not have the time to read every draft thoroughly, and other students might be better judges of whether the communication is sufficiently transparent, than the supervisor.
Also it might make the writing process easier and less lonely to meet regularly with other students and share experiences and good ideas and learn from other students' examples.

How

Two days prior to every meeting each student e-mails a maximum of five pages of draft text to the rest of the group. The 5 pages must be unfinished draft text,.If the text is ready for submission there is no reason to get further feedback.
The draft text must have a letter attached which includes guidelines as to how the draft should be perceived and what kind of feedback the writer wants. Precise instructions or questions for the readers make it easier for them to give useful feedback.

The group members then read the draft in question and prepare comments on the questions raised in the attached letter from the writer.
More generally the readers can also look at:

  • What paragraphs or sentences work well and why?
  • What paragraphs or sentences could be improved and how?
  • What paragraphs or sentences are difficult to understand?
  • What information could be added or removed to make the text easier to understand or to make the argument clearer?
  • Etc.

During the meetings, which should last about two hours, the group comments one writers' text at a time. The writer remains quiet while, one at a time, the readers give him/her their feedback on the draft text. The writer has no obligation to follow the advice given, so there is no reason to comment on the comments or explain why the suggestions won't be applied - just listen, take notes, use the useful comments and ignore the less useful.

The primary role of the educational advisor is to chair the first few meetings and to make sure everybody follows the rules and every writer gets their feedback-time. The advisor will also read the drafts and might comment on them.

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