Preparing a Dissertation Outline

There are no dissertations without dissertations outline

Are you looking for general guidelines on preparing your dissertation outline? Here is what you have been looking for. After all, the dissertation is the most important academic work of a student’s career. When preparing your dissertation, there are many things to consider. The dissertation outline is one of the first things you need to do, and that is because your final work should be clear and organized.
Writing a thesis (or a dissertation) is quite challenging. You will probably spend several months (even a year) working on this, so you must find a way to link every step, otherwise all your tasks will seem unconnected and vain. That is why you need an outline. We know it sounds like a lot of pressure, but it is quite simple actually. And even if you are not sure where to begin, here we can provide you some basic tips for preparing yours. After all, dissertation outlines are the entrance to the rest of the work, so you want yours to be right!

Why preparing an outline?

You may think at first it is a waste of time taking all this extra work: you would be wrong! This outline is rather helpful, so you should better pay attention to its writing. Since the dissertation outline is a plan which helps to connect the items of the dissertation in a logical way, your tutor will probably suggest you to create yours, first of all. Once you have it done, make at least three copies: you keep one for yourself, the others are for the tutor and for the comitee. Check the dissertation outline with your tutor, who will later give you green light to move on with your writing. Then, according to this outline, you can continue the research. The outline is aimed to define the main issues to which an explanation should be provided during the dissertation writing. The outline structure will help you organize your work and make it reasonable.

What should the outline include?

Ok, so far we have established the importance of preparing a good outline before moving on to the dissertation writing. What should an outline include in order to be interesting and useful? First of all, you must include the dissertation topic and your main statement. In the introduction, you should establish the purposes and the main dissertation issues. Every dissertation outline should also comprise the references and the literary review. As for the outline main body, there you should refer to the data and major figures. It is a good idea to divide the outline into chapters, as you will do with your complete dissertation. This will organize and thus, simplify your work later on. And don’t forget to close the outline with a conclusion.

In case you are lost, remember that although writing a dissertation is a long, hard process, you can find examples, such as an online dissertation, that will help you understand what you have to do. They can help you write better since they act as a guide for your own dissertation writing.

Tags: dissertation outline, dissertation plan, Dissertation Writing