Personal Blogs

Well, my exam happened. Was it as bad as I had feared? NO.  It was worse.

The whole experience verged on traumatic.  Less than half our original learning group attended, such was the dropout rate.  The paper was unrealistically difficult with questions on parts of the coursework that were barely touched upon while leaving out huge swathes of important work that was given considerable attention during the module.  I really think that the level was unfairly set, particularly given that this is the last time T206 is being run.

Talk about a parting shot.

That said, I did pass comfortably(63%), gaining a good second in conjuction with my OCAS score and putting me in the top 10% of students so, on a personal level at least, I am pleased with the result.

At least the aftermath was easy.  I've taken a much needed study break since T206.  The first month or so was spent untangling myself from studying, something that has been a considerable part of my life for two and a half years, non-stop, and getting to some state of normality while simultaneously trying to calm down after the exam (I didn't sleep for days).  I did eventually manage to relax and had a nice enjoyable Christmas but now the time has come to start studying again.

The materials for my next course, T211-Design and Designing, arrived 3 days ago and I've been busily setting up my study area again.  I've reviewed the workbooks, downloaded the software and watched the first few videos.  Disappointingly, much of the early stuff is lifted straight from U101 which I completed in 2011 so this will just be an exercise in repetition, for a couple of weeks at least.

Another thing with T211 is that it looks to be the most "arty-farty" of the modules I've done (bearing in mind that this is number 8) and, looking at the work required, I wish now that I had registered for another module to run alongside it as I still need to pick up another 30 points at level 3, after the OU moved the goalposts and messed up my original planned study route.  A return of the Systems module would be nice, especially if it's split into 2 30-pointers.

Don't get the wrong impression though.  I can't wait to get started with T211 and have already made inroads into the early work.  I just need to be patient now and let the course catch up with me

It's been quite a while since I added anything to this blog, in fact I can't believe it was July when I posted last.  A lot's happened since then of course.  Best of all is that, after been out of work due to illness for an extended period, I've got a new job with British Airways starting in the new year.

On the studying front, I finished both B121 and U101 with time to spare and now I'm waiting for the final results.  I must say that I hate this bit.  I finished both courses at the start of October so it's been two months now.  Of course I've been here before, waiting on completed marking, but what's making it more aggravating this time is that these two results will get me a  Certificate of Higher Education (Open) and a Certificate in Business Studies, my first actual "on-paper" qualifications from the OU. So right now I'm on tenterhooks and checking my Email every 5 minutes, itching to be able to update my CV with some new and up to date qualifications.

I do have one or two things to keep my mind off it though. Not least of which is that, despite my vow to take a few months off studying, I signed up for B322-investigating entrepreneurial opportunities, which, through some kind of perverse OU logic, counts towards a degree in Design and Innovation.  The process of choosing this course came from what I learned on U101-design thinking.  I did a problem solving exercise based around what course to take and this came up as the best option. I wouldn't have considered it otherwise.  Who says you wont apply what you learn

Well, I sat the exam for T173 and I'm pretty sure I've done well.  It wasn't a breeze, in fact it was so cold in the exam hall that it was more of a FREEZE, but I shivered my way through it and was quite happy with the result. I just wish that, in the advice booklet about what to take to the exam, it had said "wear a coat and thermals". It would have been a lot more useful than "bring a HB pencil" I can tell you - I didn't use the damn pencil once!

Of course, finishing the exam is all very nice because it marks an end to the course and you can move on to other things with a few points in the bag towards your degree, but no-one talks about how you extract yourself from a course.  Much effort is made by the OU to help ease students into courses with lots of advice and reassurances, even the courses themselves seem to be designed to start off gently, for the most part, before building up to more complex matters, to get everyone used to the workload.  But what about when a course ends? Obviously I can't speak for others, but I find it a huge anti-climax.  The studying which has become a big part of my life has now stopped.  I don't automatically reach for the engineering course books when I have a bit of spare time.  These sacred items now have to be stored away to make room for the next (or current) course and, to be honest, it's a bit of a wrench.

I went through the same thing with B120 last year. Something which has been a big part of your life for months (eight months for T173) is no longer there.  It's like losing a pet. Yet there's no support to help you. Even the course site dies a death and disappears along with all the ticked boxes and TMA marks that you work so hard for. 

So this ending has caused a bit of a hiatus in my other course work for a couple of weeks as, without T173 in my study plan, I'm having to adapt to not having a comforting engineering course to fall back on when the others (particularly B121) start to "do my head in".  At the moment, I've caught up with B121 and , in fact, got a little way ahead after four solid days of headaches and swearing at it. Now I have to put some effort into LOLA (U101) and catch up from two weeks behind.  All these problems are caused by "end of course withdrawal".

So how about it OU.  Let's have a clinic for those of us who are "course addicts" to get us unhooked cleanly and safely!

Remember the bit on your old school report -plays well with others.  Well it's back as part of U101.  We've been split up by our tutor into four separate groups for a collaborative project for TMA02.

Just to be awkward, it's been done in alphabetical order. Personally I think it should have been done by geographical location.

At least that way we could have found a pub to meet in!

Just ready to go for my U101 group tutorial yesterday and I get a phone call from the OU in Cardiff. Armed police have closed down the area because of some moron misbehaving at the building next door.  Now we'll have to complete TMA01 without the benefit of a tutorial.  The most annoying thing is that this tutorial was originally intended to be the week before but got changed a couple of weeks ago.

What with the technical and communications hassles that there have been already, I'm beginning to think that this course is jinxed.