Supervision

My supervision meetings have gone a little bit like this:

1. Stephen thinks he has made great progress.
2. Stephen begins meeting by outlining great progress.
3. Supervisors start a line of questioning that begins with, 'Have you thought about~?'
4. This line of questioning ends in Stephen asking, five or ten times, 'I'm sorry, who did you say wrote that?' quickly followed by, 'I'm sorry, how do you spell that?'
5. Then there is also a line of conversation that follows 'I think you need to read more about X term' which means more-or-less,
6. Supervisor is not convinced Stephen knows what the word Stephen has been using again and again really means.
7. This is of course true and leads to
8. Stephen trying to defend his careless use of the word or phrase or idea and realizing he doesn't know what he's talking about in the middle of the statement
9. resulting in Sarah Palin-style answers.
10. Stephen leaves with notebook full of names and articles to look up and feeling deflated.