For each graduate student, I believe that their purpose of studying is similar, that is, I hope to learn more knowledge than undergraduate in the graduate stage, and have a better career prospect in the future. Therefore, they study hard, know that they are admitted to the graduate school, the mood is excited, excited. However, after the graduate stage, in the first semester, the school arranged a large number of courses, and the tutor probably arranged a big research direction, which seemed that life and the previous undergraduate life had not changed much. Especially, many graduate students see the topic given by the tutor. Because they have no understanding of the background of the subject before, and they have no research foundation, they will easily enter a short period of "confused period". I have come from graduate stage myself, and like most graduate students, I have had a confused period. However, I was able to quickly let myself through the confused period and accelerate into "research" before I had a good academic start. Now I have been a graduate tutor. I heard a friend evaluate that one of my graduate students had a little bit of a confused feeling a few days ago. I decided to write down this article. On the one hand, I hope that my graduate students will get through the confused period as soon as possible, and on the other hand, it will provide reference for future graduate students.

1) The first reason for the freshmen 'confusion is that they do not understand the international frontier problems in the field and the scientific significance of their research projects. For my graduate students, I hope that their work is currently a more advanced field in the world, so that they can still be engaged in this direction for several years after graduation. In this way, they will have enough time to think about the research work in the frontier areas in the next few years. Therefore, the subjects I arranged for graduate students are "no previous projects". For undergraduates, they are used to learning the knowledge in books. Suddenly, entered the graduate stage, found that what they want to do in the book can not find, and soon will enter a confused state. This work has not been done by predecessors, or they have not done it, can a new graduate student do it? Facing this situation, the graduate students must read a lot of academic papers in the first semester. Through reading these documents, we can understand why the tutor arranges you to do such a project, and know why your own topic can be said to be a leading research issue or key research field in the world. How should graduate students read literature? Generally, it can be developed as follows: 1. read the Chinese review paper, so as to understand the background of a research field. 2. reading English review papers, on the basis of Chinese review papers, we can understand some key words in this field, and also increase the understanding of important international issues. 3. start reading 10-20 Chinese research papers in a general way to let yourself know how the paper was written, and such achievements can be written into Chinese papers. 4. read the latest English research papers. During my work in Australia, the doctoral students of the research group were reading literature in the first year. Through reading the literature by themselves and combining with the research projects set by the tutor, the graduate students began to develop research programs and carry out experiments and theoretical work quickly. This is why domestic graduate students have the hard requirements of the number of literature reading. Master students read 60-80 literature, and doctoral students 120-180 literature. When the graduate students read the literature, because there is no accumulated professional knowledge before, it may not be forgotten immediately after reading a document. Therefore, the graduate students need to sort out the documents they have read. It is better to organize one document when reading one document. When the number of documents is more than 50, it will become more and more easy to read the literature.

2) The second reason for the freshmen's confusion is that they don't know what "research" is and where to start. Many graduate students enter the research group and find that their research projects are totally different from the scientific things, or they have no accumulation of prior knowledge. So, they felt confused in a moment. How should we start these work? Even worry about the future to graduate smoothly! For this problem, the freshmen should have a quick understanding of the laboratory equipment besides class and literature. When reading the literature, postgraduates have known some equipment names and experimental methods mentioned in the literature. At this time, they should know whether the project group has these equipment, if the research group does not have these equipment, whether the college has these equipment, if the college does not, then they should know whether some other relevant colleges or public research centers have relevant equipment. Then, find an opportunity to go to these places to learn how they will use the equipment in the future. In addition, ask if the devices allow graduate students to operate on their own, and if so, who can learn how to use them. For these content, mentors are likely not to teach graduate students hand in hand, so graduate students' initiative becomes very important. Of course, if it takes a certain fee to study the use of equipment, you can consult with the tutor. Generally, the tutors will agree. In University, many testing equipment have free training. If students know it themselves and want to learn how to use them, the tutor will try their best to fight for graduate students. In addition, for a project group, it is impossible to own any equipment. Moreover, there are many equipment that need a certain period from purchase to use. For a good experimental idea, it is necessary to complete it with the conditions available. If the school does not, it is good to find out where to do it and let the tutor pay for it. Graduate students must strive for training opportunities for each equipment. If they find it, they will attend it. They will always use it later.

3) The third reason for the confusion of graduate students is that the course is relatively relaxed, and the spare time does not know what to do well. Graduate students are easy to pass the class, so many graduate students don't know what to do after class. So a part of graduate students began to learn to play online games, watch TV plays. I personally object to graduate students playing online games and watching TV series. Both of these things are very time-consuming. If the first semester of graduate students has developed this habit, it is very difficult to modify them in the second semester and later graduate school. This is called "bad habits". I often warn undergraduates not to indulge in online games, otherwise, they may soon be faced with being dropped out of school. For graduate students, there is no heavy test pressure, although it is not likely to get any punishment, but time does not need to look at literature, do experiments and write papers, and when graduate students graduate, it may not be you pick work but work to pick you. Some students asked me where to work for graduate students in my research group in the future. In fact, there is not much to do with where graduate students can work and who to study. The key is to see if he has received "regular and strict" research training during the graduate period and whether he can master the ability of independent research through training. If you know how the research is carried out, you can do any work well later. Therefore, how to make themselves busy in the first semester of graduate school is the above two articles, reading more literature, thinking more about how to do experiments, and learning more methods of using "experimental tools", including finite element and other numerical analysis methods, application and use methods of experimental instruments, and analysis methods of scientific data.

Of course, the role of tutor is also very important in the period of Freshmen 'confusion. Besides solving problems by themselves, it is also important to communicate with the tutor in time when they encounter problems and difficulties. Especially the younger teachers, who come here themselves, know the importance of helping you to pass the confused period quickly. This is also the purpose of my writing. I hope you can enter the research status and make good academic achievements as soon as possible.