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Not drowning, but waving.
Oct. 2nd, 2009 03:50 pmI get a comb-bound copy of my main textbook from the Open University. It allows me to read while lying down without getting tired arms, and it lets me drop it and not lose the page. It is nifty. (I get a normal copy of the text book with all my other study materials, as well).
It has Activities in it, usually 15 minutes, give or take, or as much time as I have 'guaranteed' study time each morning. There are 89 of these. They are not marked, but they do look useful. If I do four of them every week, that takes me into March - it does let me keep studying hieroglyphs, equality studies, religious studies and my project, just more slowly than before. Or I could drop *everything* and just do Y160 exclusively and end up with extra weeks to actually write my TMAs. But I don't want to. I especially don't want to give up studying Norse mythology on the day that is holy to my Goddess, even if such putting aside of one day per week is a bit Judeo-Christian.
So, I was flailing a bit, until Random sat me down and went over a 10 point course she's successfully completed already, with the TMAs and the Activities, and discussed what *actually* happened when she studied them. Her advice was really good. Most of it was that if an Activity is a struggle, ignore it and concentrate on the TMA that actually gets marked.
She also said it was normal to have three schedules, one of which was the 'ideal' one of what you think you should do and one is what actually happens. I forget what the third was.
She gave me a journal book to write in, which saves me having to get one. It will be *festooned* with stickers. I could be very twee and add one every time I do some work on the course.
It does feel as though doing the 10 pointer is very necessary preparation for my doing a 60-pointer. I looked at her 60 pointer and I would have been completely overwhelmed if I had gone into it cold. My approach to my A-levels was to read *everything* and then put off writing anything down outside of class until, if possible, the day of the exam. For my NVQ, I worked flat out at college then ignored all the work completely until the evening before college. I can't work like that now. I have to do a small amount of work every day and schedule it, because most of the rest of the time I am a Gumby and my brain hurts. The 10-pointer is doing its job of letting me test the waters and learn how to keep afloat.
It has Activities in it, usually 15 minutes, give or take, or as much time as I have 'guaranteed' study time each morning. There are 89 of these. They are not marked, but they do look useful. If I do four of them every week, that takes me into March - it does let me keep studying hieroglyphs, equality studies, religious studies and my project, just more slowly than before. Or I could drop *everything* and just do Y160 exclusively and end up with extra weeks to actually write my TMAs. But I don't want to. I especially don't want to give up studying Norse mythology on the day that is holy to my Goddess, even if such putting aside of one day per week is a bit Judeo-Christian.
So, I was flailing a bit, until Random sat me down and went over a 10 point course she's successfully completed already, with the TMAs and the Activities, and discussed what *actually* happened when she studied them. Her advice was really good. Most of it was that if an Activity is a struggle, ignore it and concentrate on the TMA that actually gets marked.
She also said it was normal to have three schedules, one of which was the 'ideal' one of what you think you should do and one is what actually happens. I forget what the third was.
She gave me a journal book to write in, which saves me having to get one. It will be *festooned* with stickers. I could be very twee and add one every time I do some work on the course.
It does feel as though doing the 10 pointer is very necessary preparation for my doing a 60-pointer. I looked at her 60 pointer and I would have been completely overwhelmed if I had gone into it cold. My approach to my A-levels was to read *everything* and then put off writing anything down outside of class until, if possible, the day of the exam. For my NVQ, I worked flat out at college then ignored all the work completely until the evening before college. I can't work like that now. I have to do a small amount of work every day and schedule it, because most of the rest of the time I am a Gumby and my brain hurts. The 10-pointer is doing its job of letting me test the waters and learn how to keep afloat.
