With a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering and more than 12 years of experience as a science communicator, I'm an expert at helping scientists tell their science stories. If you're looking to become a more confident communicator of science, check out my newsletter!
Issue 14 - Writing Through Distractions
Hi, Reader! It's been a busy few weeks around here, with lots of distractions interrupting my efforts at progress. I imagine I'm not alone in that situation, so this newsletter's posts contain some advice, not for avoiding distractions (because, frankly, sometimes that's impossible) but for getting things done in spite of them.
And if you've got any good tips, I'm all ears! Let me know how you structure your work to make progress even when the world demands your attention elsewhere.
Writing Through Distractions
Between a jackhammer outside the window and constant familial interruptions, how am I supposed to write? For me, breaking projects down into discrete tasks and relying heavily on planning are what make progress possible.
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How I Take Literature Notes
There comes a time when you can't hold all of that research in your head at the same time anymore. This post takes a look at what I've done to help my future self find and use the articles I've read.
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From Around the Web
- Notes on Paper, Notes in Apps, Here, There, and Everywhere, Should I Just Give Up and Accept the Chaos? - Don't let my literature note post fool you; my life is covered in paper notes, too. As Analog Office points out, the key to managing all of these notes is having a system.
- Have you applied the "fail fast" concept to scicomm? - This Twitter thread advocates for trying things out and seeing what works instead of overthinking it all.
From the Archives
Speaking of projects that took a long time to come to fruition, I spent years searching for information about Agnes Pockels before I was able to write, film, and publish this video about the surface tension pioneer.
| Watch It Here |
That's it for now! I'll see you again in two weeks with more scicomm tips, tricks, and inspiration. - Nicole
Nicole Sharp, Ph.D.
With a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering and more than 12 years of experience as a science communicator, I'm an expert at helping scientists tell their science stories. If you're looking to become a more confident communicator of science, check out my newsletter!
Hi, Reader! This year my summer calendar has a massive question mark hanging over it. That's not, in my experience, conducive to steady, quality writing each week. So I've decided to put the blog and this newsletter on a hiatus until life gets a little more certain. I expect to return in a couple months with lots more to say and share about communicating science. In the meantime, though, I leave you with another edition of "Fixed It For You" - this time powered by ChatGPT. Or rather, inspired...
Hi, Reader! Whether you like them or loathe them, we all have to deal with time and word limits at some point. In this issue, I take a look at the questions you should ask yourself anytime you're operating with one of these constraints. And because we all sometimes have budget constraints, too, I share some of my secrets for finding free, royalty-free images, video footage, music, and sound effects. I hope they'll help you dress up your presentations, videos, and research posters without...
Hi, Reader! Since I was asked a few weeks ago to prepare a five-minute, no-slides talk for Fellows of the Royal Society, I've had constraints on the brain. I feel like we scientists and engineers love to complain about time limits and word counts and just not having enough space for our voices and ideas. But the more I thought about constraints in other contexts, like art, the more I realized that constraints are, in fact, a good thing to have. And not just for the audience or conference...