Students seem to encounter various challenges when writing bachelor's and master's theses, indicating a need to support them in their writing processes. In this study, academic writing workshops for students writing bachelor's and master's theses were developed and investigated during three years of a participatory action research project. The…

The expansionist nature of the higher education sector has led to an increase in the provision of online Masters programmes. Many of these programmes are offered part-time attracting working professionals. The dissertation component that can be the culmination of many of these degrees is largely unexplored. A constructivist grounded theory…

Drawing on supervisor and supervisee interviews, analysis of supervisor feedback on the supervisee's draft chapters, and departmental supervisory guidelines, this study focuses on the roles a master's dissertation supervisor plays during the course of supervision. These roles are discussed referring to models of supervisory pedagogy, the teaching,…

This paper provides insights into thesis supervisors' perceptions of the supervisory relationship and process in English-medium international master's degree programmes (IMDPs). It contributes to the field of supervisory pedagogy in a master's level education by examining how supervisors perceive their supervisory practices and what they consider…

While recent research has highlighted the increasing importance of peer feedback as a supplementary pedagogy to supervision in higher education academic contexts, little is known regarding whether and how peer feedback can induct research students into the academic discourse community. Underpinned by the academic discourse community theory, this…

While the number of postgraduate students is increasing, the writing of a master's dissertation still poses numerous challenges to them. The outcome of this work depends just as much on technical and methodological skills as on affects, self-regulation, and the relationship to the supervisor. In order to test a comprehensive model including all…

Higher education research has overlooked online distance Masters students' experiences of independent research, and this is an important gap at a time when increasing numbers of taught postgraduate programmes are delivered online. This article discusses findings from interviews with eighteen graduates from four online Masters programmes. It…

There are many challenges that undergraduate students face when studying an honours research degree. Honours programmes though traditionally considered within the business discipline as a loss leader, nevertheless, form a direct entry requirement for PhD programmes. The honours degree can be considered a formative research programme for student…

Research supervision can be investigated from social-emotional and cognitive perspectives, but most studies include only one perspective. This study aims to understand the interplay between a social-emotional (supervisor-student relationship) and cognitive (feedback) perspective on the outcomes of master's thesis supervision in specific, by…

Supervising masters and doctoral dissertations is a key function of teaching in higher education and giving written feedback on draft sections is an essential component of this function. However, the specific types of response that supervisors give to their dissertation students' written work have received limited research interest to date. The…

This article considers how course design accommodates the adaptation of L2 students into the early stages of the master's dissertation (Social Sciences and Humanities) at a UK university. I present a contrastive process-oriented analysis of two students' experiences on different courses, extracted from a 13-month ethnographic study in which…

In this article I describe my interaction as an English for academic purposes (EAP) practitioner with a supervisor and her two postgraduate international students, both of whom were second language speakers of English (L2). Because of linguistic and relationship issues the supervisory experience for the parties was challenging and frustrating. I…

Many studies into the process of producing and supervising dissertations exist, yet little research into the "product" of the Masters dissertation, or into how Masters supervision changes over time exist. Drawing on 62 semi-structured interviews with 31 Maths and Computer Science supervisors over a two-year period, this paper explores…

Online or web-based peer assessment is a valuable and effective way to help the learner to examine his or her learning progress, and teachers need to be familiar with the practice before they use it in their classrooms. Therefore, the purpose of our study was to design an online peer assessment activity for 37 inservice science and mathematics…