Fostering Doctoral Student Socialization and Research Expertise through Writing Pedagogy

In this article, we introduce a pedagogical exercise for doctoral writing and publication that aims to support students’ grounding in their research and to demonstrate concretized thinking throughout various stages of the research/writing/doctoral milestone process. We add to existing doctoral writing pedagogies with the contribution of the 7-Slide Update, which guides doctoral students to focus on key dissertation elements to support their socialization into and communication within academic discourse communities. This exercise creates a structure by which students can begin articulating their research, charting yearly progress, and developing as communicators of scholarship through written and oral means. The pedagogical exercise also supports socialization as doctoral students position their work in their respective disciplinary or academic discourse communities as it emphasizes developing research expertise and scholarly communication skills. The exercise is adaptable for use in doctoral and graduate-level programs. The article presents the original implementation of the exercise at a doctoral student residency and its modified version implemented a year later. Feedback from student and faculty participants is shared and implications are detailed.