Follow a science writer using a motivation trick -- a STEM career glimpse

Do you ever feel a burning desire to start a new project?

I often do, and I use it to fuel the completion of current projects, one by one.

My experience is that new ideas are exciting--fresh, clever, perfect! I can't wait to get started on them.

But soon after starting, challenges arise--problems to solve. Maybe what I have is not as good as what I had dreamed up. It's taking forever. It's just plain hard. Then it sits.

Fortunately, I always have other ideas, and a burning desire to start on those.

Here's my trick: I tell myself that I can't start a new project until I've finished the current one. As if by magic, I begin to tackle problems, come up with solutions, and find extra energy to get it all done.

How do I make myself finish the old project before starting the new one? I have the discipline simply because this trick works like a charm.

The triumph of completing project after project and getting tons of things done makes me want to use this trick again and again.

Try it a few times. If it helps, you too might want to do it again!

LINKS

• This motivation trick is more powerful for small, short projects than the last two: telling a friend or keeping a hope journal.

• For a ton of links about science writing, scroll down to LINKS AND MORE after you click here.

Follow a science writer using a motivation trick - a STEM career glimpse

If you wish you could make more progress on a long, hard project, try this trick. It helps me. Maybe it will help you too.

I use this trick when I'm writing a book, and it's hard to find or make the time after working as a scientist and translator, and taking care of family, friends, and home.

I keep a "hope journal." It's not a regular journal or diary. I write in it only what I've done to make progress on one project--nothing else--every day, for two weeks or two months or until the project is done. One hope journal is for only one project.

A hope journal begins as a blank notebook. I like small books for my small hands.

Hope journals
for The Night Olympic Tea, Horse Stories, and two future books

First, write the name of your project on the cover.

Then, every day, write down the date and what you did on that date to make progress.

I like to circle the date, and to write in blue or black every other day.

It's O.K. if you don't move mountains every day. Do your best to do something, every single day.

Writing in my hope journal at night was too hard because I was tired. Now I write, first thing in the morning, what I did the day before.

For example, I wrote in my hope journal for Horse Stories, about a story entitled "Paco of the Andes:"

- I revised Paco in my hotel room, in pencil on a printout.

- I revised Paco in the plane on the way home.

- I started entering my edits into my Word file, from the printout I carried on my trip.

- I finished entering edits and reprinted Paco.

I submitted "Paco of the Andes" to The School Magazine in Australia in August 2008. The editor accepted it for publication within two months. It was published within a year after that.

My horse stories are fictional, but I do research, check facts, and consult experts, exactly as I would for science writing.

The funniest entry I made was in my hope journal for The Night Olympic Team: I wanted to highlight background information, to make sure it didn't go on too long, taking readers out of the ongoing story. But I dropped the highlighter. It left a spot on the carpet. ARGH! I tried to get it off with spot remover. When that didn't work well enough... I gave the carpet a haircut!

Keeping a hope journal is as powerful for me as telling a friend what I will get done before we meet (read my post about that trick). The journal works better because it goes on day after day.

LINK

• For a ton of links about science writing, scroll down to LINKS AND MORE after you click here.

Follow a science writer using a motivation trick - a STEM career glimpse

If you wish you could get more done, try this trick. It works for me. Maybe it will work for you too.

I use this trick when I'm working on a new writing, but have no deadline to drive me to make progress.

Sometimes choosing my own deadline helps: "I'll complete the first draft by March 31."

What helps ten times more is simply telling a friend. And what helps even more is telling a friend whom I'm scheduled to meet, what I'll get done by the time we meet: "I'll finish revising once by the time I see you."

For my writing, this works best with friends who are also writers. For my science work, it works best with friends who are also scientists. They understand what it takes to get the exact kind of hard work done. Their cheers are most gut-felt.

Best of all, they can also tell me what they'll get done by the time we meet. We can help each other even if the work is not team work.

Try this for a project dear to your heart, especially if it has no deadline and you wish you could make more progress.

LINK

• For a ton of links about science writing, scroll down to LINKS AND MORE after you click here.

Life tip: a weight control trick

It's hard for me to avoid gaining weight, but I manage to do it by being active enough and by not eating (too much) more than I should. In fact, "Stop eating when you're full" is one of the heatlthy-lifestyle tips I give in my science book, The Night Olympic Team. But it's easier said than done!
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To be able to follow my own advice, I use a trick. Before sitting down for dinner, I plan an irresistible fun thing to do afterwards, so I can't... resist doing it--instead of having seconds. It's often a craft activity.
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For example, I just finished making a birdhouse pin. First, I sketched it on scratch paper. Then I made it out of modeling clay (the brand name is Sculpey). This took several sittings. After making sure I liked the birdhouse, I hardened it by baking it in the oven (pencil shown for scale):
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Next, I painted it with acrylic paint:
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Finally, I glued the hardware (available from bead shops, craft supplies shops, or jewelry supplies shops) on the back.
Chirp!

Follow a dentist – a STEM career glimpse

by Minh Tam Dang, DDS (Doctor of Dental Surgery)

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If you like taking care of people, as I do, you might love to be a dentist like me.

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I do a large variety of things at work, including saving teeth and smiles. Like the day a commotion in the waiting room drew me out of my office. Anguished voices talked at the same time.

“Oh, my!”

“He got banged in the mouth."

A teen was pressing a blood-stained tissue on his lips. His father leaned over the receptionist’s counter.

“He broke a tooth right in front.”

I took the wounded boy to the big chair. “Let me look.”

The dental assistant gently rinsed the blood away with a stream of water so I could see. “Only one tooth looks damaged.” It was a top tooth, one of the two middle ones, broken at a slant one third of the way up. “Let’s take an X-ray.”

The dental assistant led the boy to the X-ray cubicle while I walked to my desk to wait for the digital image to appear on my computer screen. I stared at the tooth all over—what was left of it—especially the root, the bone around it, and the middle of the tooth, or pulp chamber, containing the nerve. The break was far enough from the pulp chamber, so there was no need to empty it, then fill it with an artificial material (do a root canal treatment).

Dr. Dang reviewing an X-ray (but not the one in the story)

That was very good news. A live tooth is stronger and sturdier than a dead or fake tooth.

The plan, then, was to cap the broken tooth with a temporary crown and replace it with a permanent crown later.

A crown is hollow, somewhat like a pencil cup. Its outside shape must match the original tooth. Its inside shape must fit the broken tooth—after it’s been prepared by filing it down, to make room for the crown.

First I numbed the tooth and gum with pain killers (anesthetics), by rubbing a numbing gel on the gum, then giving an injection next to the tooth. After a few minutes, I made sure the patient couldn’t feel a thing by testing the gums all around the tooth.

Next, I pictured the prepared tooth in my mind and filed down as needed. The taper and smoothness were very important for the finished product to look good, with no visible line where the crown would meet the natural tooth, just under the gum line. It was like carving a miniature sculpture, except it would not sit in a glass case untouched--it would chomp on food, many times a day for years to come. It would also be seen every time this young man smiled.

I took a mold (impression) of the prepared tooth. I filled a special, small “tray” with a special, soft paste. I squirted softer paste on the tooth to capture the finest details of the edges, so the crown would fit perfectly.

I put the tray in place and asked the patient to bite down. Minutes later, the paste had hardened (set). I took the tray out, sprayed it with disinfectant, and bagged it.

To order the crown, I wrote up the lab slip and asked the lab to make it of porcelain (not porcelain fused to metal or gold). I specified the color closest to that of the other teeth. I held a color chart next to the patient’s teeth and he helped pick the shade.

The lab courier, who comes by every day, picked up the bag and slip. It would take the lab roughly two weeks to make the crown.

Meanwhile, the patient needed a temporary crown. The dental assistant made it, because no pre-made, stock acrylic crown was quite right. She glued it on with temporary cement.

The patient walked out smiling and having silly fun with the numbness, which would disappear within a few hours.

Every team member had to do excellent work to get fine details just right.

As the dentist, I had to prepare the tooth so it would be just the right size and shape. It couldn’t be too thin or it would break. It couldn’t be too thick or else it’s the crown that would be too thin. The filing-down couldn’t come too close to the nerve or the tooth would be sensitive and hurt all the time. The mold could not be distorted, or the crown wouldn’t be the right shape inside and it wouldn’t fit.

The dental assistant faced many similar challenges when putting together a temporary crown.

The lab people used the mold to make a plaster model of the prepared tooth and neighboring teeth, then made a permanent crown on the model. When this crown was ready, it was tried on and final adjustments were made for a perfect fit, before it was cemented in place.

Crowns can last a long time (if their owners take care of their mouths, by brushing twice a day, flossing once a day and seeing a dentist every six months) and that’s something to smile about!

ABOUT MINH TAM DANG

When Tam is not working, she loves arranging flowers, gardening, playing with her two cats (Diddi, also known as “The D,” and Louie), painting with watercolors, quilting, reading and writing Vietnamese poetry, and playing tennis, hiking or riding bikes with family.

LINKS

● Watch this short video overview of dentist careers.

● For a little longer overview of dentist careers, click on “Listen to the podcast…” at the Sloan Career Cornerstone Center. It’s an introduction to the required schooling, a day-in-the-life of a dentist, salary info, specialties, and the great job market in the years ahead.

● For dentist interviews, click on the names below.

Jennifer Cyriaque

James Tynecki

Stephen Sterlitz

● Watch this 25-minute award-winning career video about “Women in Dental Research.” After a brief history of dentistry, it follows three amazing women. One fought the AIDS epidemic, the second one, a molecular researcher, studies oral disease and cancer, and the third one leads researchers who provide free dental care to children.

Follow a hospital dietitian – a STEM career glimpse

by Mary Ann Dames, M.S., R.D. (Master of Science, Registered Dietitian)







Self-portrait by Mary Ann Dames




If you like imagining what you could do with food, you might love to be the kind of dietitian I am.

Planning and preparing food has such a powerful impact on our health and energy, it’s a science called dietetics. The professionals in this field are called dietitians or nutritionists. They work for schools, sports teams, companies with food services for employees, and hospitals, to name only a few.
As a hospital dietitian for many years, my job included teaching patients how to make changes in diet in order to improve their health. I also created clever nutrition programs for patients with special dietary needs.

Patients who arrive at the hospital suddenly lose control of their lives. A caring health team takes over. Doctors decide how to treat them. Nurses give them instructions. Others dictate their daily schedule.

Many patients are scared. Most are stressed. Some take it out on something. Guess what they pick on?

You got it—hospital food. It isn’t like what they’re used to. Maybe they don’t eat American food at home. Or they are on a restricted diet. Or the food tastes funny due to the aftereffects of anesthesia or medication.

And I got to hear all about it when I walked in their rooms to do one special part of my job: diet education. Patients who complain aren’t being mean—they want some control back.

I remember a man (I’ll call him Mr. Doe) whose wife paced around or hovered while I tried to give him advice. I was actually glad she was there so that she could hear it too.

I needed to talk Mr. Doe into drinking less alcohol, eating healthier foods, and exercising more. But the first thing he said was, “When I go home, I want to go back to normal.” And he really wanted his two nightly beers.

Mrs. Doe declared that he was going to follow his new diet. She started doing the one thing that wasn’t going to work: nagging him. I said to her, “Although you love him very much, you can’t make him change.” What she could do was to shop wisely to make the appropriate foods available. Then, whatever Mr. Doe ate or drank would be up to him, even if it broke her heart.

When he saw how upset his wife was, his face softened. And when I gave him back some control, he almost smiled.

I said to him, “You don’t need to change your whole diet overnight. Maybe you can think about making one small change.”

He nodded.

Then I told both of them, “It’s a learning process. One step at time—one food at a time, one change in exercise—would be fine.”

And just in case he’d be ready to make one more change, maybe in a week or in a month, I gave them handouts and went over them.

By the time I left his room, Mr. Doe had decided to cut back to one beer a night. He and his wife were reading the handouts and planning what to do as a team.









He was in charge again.



As a dietitian, many days people skills are even more important than scientific knowledge. All the science courses I took help me understand what is happening physically to my patients. But what it comes down to is finding a way to inspire one patient at a time to make one change at a time.

Now that I’m retired, I am fulfilling a dream. I’m giving back to the world through a blog, “Reading, Writing, and Recipes”. If children can learn about food, nutrition, and cooking through my blog and elsewhere, maybe they won’t grow up to be like Mr. Doe, because they will have been leading a healthy lifestyle all along.











Mary Ann Dames, M.S., R.D.

LINKS

● For a quick-and-easy overview of dietitian and nutritionist careers, click on “Listen to the podcast…” at the Sloan Career Cornerstone Center. It’s an introduction to the required schooling, a day-in-the-life of a dietitian, salary info, where dietitians work, and the favorable job market in the years ahead.

● For another friendly overview, read "Science Careers: Dietitian or Nutritionist" at ScienceBuddies.org.

● For examples of dietitians’ jobs, from personal chef for a movie star to policy-maker in Washington, watch the American Dietetic Association video.

● Read an interview of a dietitian and nutritionist (why she chose her career, her workday, what she likes best and least about work, career goals, hobbies).

● For current trends from the point of view of another dietitian, read the article, “Hospital dietitian's job more than just playing with food.”

● See Robin, a registered dietitian, talk about her job as a pharmaceutical sales representative or "drug rep" in a 5-minute video interview about a typical day, job requirements, and the best and worst parts of the job.

● If you are a teen, and you want to get the most energy out of what you put in your body, this nutrition guide for students and athletes is for you!

Updated August 6, 2011

Why start a STEM Careers Blog?

For girls and boys like you,

● to help answer a question you might ask, about Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) professionals: “What exactly do they do?”

● to go one step beyond what many excellent websites offer (STEM careers overviews, a day-in-the-life of STEM professionals, profiles, interviews) by showing you specific examples of some of the things STEM professionals do and how they do them (click on '"GLIMPSE" in the column on the right)

● to help you

- decide whether a STEM career is right for you

- find your truth

- in one word…

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I dedicate this blog launch to Tech Trek science camp girls.
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Updated May 27, 2011