And so it begins...

This blog is the sister to my livejournal account - this is just to let me vent/think/understand my OU study process.

I'm also using it to track some of the blogs that I read on Blogger...

the story so far ...

I went to university for about 4 years fulltime (Engineering, followed by Theoretical Physics), but spent rather too much time partying, (passed 1st year Eng and 1st year TP, failed 2nd year TP and barely tried 2nd year TP the second time). Eventually real life intervened, and off I went into the real world. 

A few years later, I went back to college by evening to do Computer science. I passed 1st and 2nd year CS and started 3rd year, but between one thing and another, it all got away from me.

Third time lucky? Perhaps. I'm back at open university studying Computing and Systems. Due to my regular previous studies, I have an exemption for 90 points (360 needed for a degree). Last year (Sept 2007) I did the following

• T175 - 20 points - passed 
  
• M257 - 30 points - passed with distinction
  
• M253 - 10 points - passed
  
• T214 - 60 points - passed with distinction.
  

I learnt a few things - some of which shouldn't be too surprising

1. 120 points (the equivalent of a full-time degree) is too many to do alongside a fairly punishing fulltime job.
   
2. I breeze through the technical things, but struggle with the "softer skill" courses.
   
3. I need to work on my study timetable, so I don't always feel miles behind.
   
4. I need to prepare better for holidays, so I don't come back to a huge pile of work.
   
5. you can come back from a position of "no idea what's happening" to doing ok on a TMA (Tutor Marked Assignment).
   
6. I need to keep notes on both my coursework AND on my reading.
   
7. T214 was really difficult for me - I'm still shocked that I passed. My notes are ungood, and haven't exactly set me up well for T306
   

From January, I'm starting on another two courses

• M359 (Databases) (30 points)
  
• T306 (Systems complexity) (60 points)
  

After these, it's only 60 points to my shiny degree :)

Anyway, I'm kind of itching to get started, but at the same time, I'm dreading starting it all over again... 

This week I need to...

• sort out how I'm going to keep my notes for the two courses - will I use a similar mechanism on them both? For T306, I think I'm going to use (a) a blog for my learning journal and my project journal (b) mindmaps for my notes. I haven't decided about the database stuff ...
• put my OU schedule into Google calander - Done, for T306
  
• start to get my mind around the T306 material, which arrived last month - read the course guide and the project introduction, need to read a bit more 
  

This week I could also...

• review my T214 notes 
  
• sort out my T214 filing.
  
• update Google calander with other things I'm doing during the year

Woohoo.