In Brazil, degree-oriented graduate programs include from two to four partial oral reports on work progress, as well as the writing of a doctoral dissertation or master’s thesis. Practice has shown, however, that it is difficult to keep the frequency and intensity of these activities at a high enough level to meet the demands of the respective program coordination. There are several reasons for this, of which two stand out: to produce a thesis or dissertation is (i) a long term job, and (ii) intellectually solitary work; since only the graduate student himself, and sometimes his advisor, are actually involved in the research. Taking into account these two aspects (among others), a methodology was developed that was able to contribute to reducing the dimensions of these two problems. The traditionally informal oral reports take on the status of an academic course, with a structure built specifically to deal with the problems and, therefore, to minimize their undesirable effects. This study presents the methodology developed, the documents created to aid it, and the results observed in the first three terms of its application.