Time/Place: Summer Semester 2023/24, Thurday 09:00-12:10, Room I-8, MS Team Semproj
Credits: 5
Lecturer: RNDr. Kristína Malinovská, PhD., Centre for Cognitive Science, Dept. of Applied Informatics, kristina.rebrova(AT)gmail.com, KM's homepage
Aim of this course is to gain experience and skills in the domain of scientific work. Students choose their topics of interest, create research goals and tasks arranged in a coherent work plan, according to which they work on the project and present the partial outcomes of their project during the semester. At the end of the term students present their results in form of a poster accompanied by a scientific abstract on an international student conference of the MEi:CogSci consortium. Apart from independent research work experience students gain and practice transferable skills such as planning, evaluating their work progress, presenting ideas and results, scientific writing, and reviewing. Please note that the attendance at the MEi:CogSci Conference is obligatory and a necessary condition to pass this course.
1 May 2024 23:59 CEST: Deadline for Author's Registration
10 May 2024 23:59 CEST: Submission of Abstracts
15 May 2024 23:59 CEST: Receive Abstracts for Review
21 May 2024 23:59 CEST: Submission of Reviews
24 May 2024 23:59 CEST: Receive Reviews of Abstract
31 May 2024 23:59 CEST: Submission of Final Abstracts
| Date | Presentations | Additional deadlines |
|---|---|---|
| 15.02. | Introductory information, course assessment | |
| 28.02. | Merge with MS seminar | |
| 14.03. | Topic & plan | |
| 21.03. | Workshop: literature | 27.03. Project specification: first version |
| 11.04. | Literature | |
| 25.04. | Workshop: LaTeX | 10.05. Abstract for review |
| 02.05. | Results (preliminary) | 21.05. Abstract review & 31.05. Abstract final |
| 30.05. | Poster 1st version (content) | 31.05. Project specification: final version |
| 06.05. | Poster final version | |
| 13-15.06. | MEi:CogSci Conference 2024 Bratislava | |
| Assignment | Milestones | Percents | Due date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Project specification | First version | 5% | 31.3. |
| Complete document | 15% | 31.5. | |
| Presentations | Topic & plan | 10% | 02. & 09.03. |
| Studied literature | 10% | 28. & 30.03. | |
| Results (preliminary) | 10% | 27.04. & 04.05. | |
| Poster | 15% | 2.05. | |
| Final poster | 15% | 30.05. & 06.06. | |
| Overall research outcome | 20% | ||
| Extra: workshop presentation | 5% | ||
| 0-50 % | Fx |
| 51-60 % | E |
| 61-70 % | D |
| 71-80 % | C |
| 81-90 % | B |
| 91-100 % | A |
Project specification assignment output is to be handed in by email or through a shared document, other assignments require the students to attend the seminar and to give a presentation as well as to actively give feedback and participate in the discussion.
The project specification template will be sent to students via email.
legacy material, new in Teams
1note that from this year on there is a new template
2note that from this year on there is a new template
The short presentations on the progress of your work should be approximately 5-10 minutes long, similarly to the ICS presentations from the last semester.
The presentations should not go very deeply into some particular matters (e.g. no technical details), but rather inform the audience on conceptual (rather superficial) level. Try to be as clear as possible, take it as an exercise in "ordering" of your thoughts and ideas. Note that the content of these presentations constitutes no commitment for your future work, but rather the current state of the project development. Any small or big details of your project might change in the course of the semester.
Try to give your presentation a nice form. According to the picture superiority effect pictures and images are remembered more likely than words. The main aim of these assignment is for you to brush your presentation skills.
In this presentation you should introduce the topic you are going to study. Explain briefly the phenomenon you are going to explore or at least the field of your interest in this project. You should also present your very first estimate of the Project plan on the level of Project steps, i.e. provide an approximate delivery date (or time such as the second half of April) for each of the 5 or 6 prescribed project steps from the project specification. Note that these are just first estimates, not commitments.
A short presentation on selected papers that are most important for your project. Limit yourself to 2-3 key concepts or studies reflecting state of the art in the area. Your presentation should include clear conceptualization of your research phenomena, theoretical paradigm or framework you are building on. Introduce your research questions and/or hypotheses (hypotheses should be based on theoretical framework or previous research findings). If possible, outline what have you gained from studying this literature - e.g. an experimental methodology and procedure in empirical research or an algorithm in modeling. In case of the theoretical project, instead of presenting the methodology, you can aim at identifying the gaps in the presented research.
Report on your results or preliminary result and the current progress of your work.
You should present the results and texts (and figures, tables, ..etc.) you are going to present on your poster on the conference. Try also to think about 2-3 sentences you are going to give to random poster visitors in reply to usual naive visitor question "what is your poster/research about?". You can also present and get feedback on your poster layout or it's draft.
The main task in the Project specification assignment is to create a plan of work and change the estimates accordingly to the actual progress of your work. Then you can reflect on the differences and learn to plan more accurately in the future. The project specification templates have been delivered to you via email. You can download them and send the two versions (described below) via email or you can utilize the Google Docs service and share your specification with (both) teachers.
In the beginning of your work you should fill in the first 2 pages of the Project specification, but also make a draft of the Project Plan part (pages 3-5). The first 2 pages are about the topic/phenomenon, learning outcomes, and a short description of the project (300-500 chars). Note that you can also change these in your final document version and check whether the estimated learning outcomes correspond to actual learning outcomes of the project.
This one is delivered nearing the end of the work on the project and should also reflect the actual work progress on the project including the Project Plan with deadlines and milestones. The estimate of ECTS or work hours is not required, although you can practice that as well in order to be more prepared for planning of your mobility project next semester. Also the Project Schedule Gantt chart is totally voluntary (it is not even a part of Mobility Learning Contract template), but it might give you insight into your work progress and some more project proposal experience (as well as some extra points). The final version of the document should contain the final version of your scientific abstract that you will be required to submit for the MEi:CogSci conference (named Short Project Report in the document).
