Never again… no way EVER!

I’ll start with my sob story first then get into the boring, ahem, the other stuff. 

 

Damn life. Sometimes it feels like it conspires aagainst me. I have had some personal issues since starting this paper including both my kids having chickenpox and ear infections and um, how to put this… they were around all the time, like ALL the time - after all it is school holidays at the moment so of course they were around. Then my ex-husband came visiting the kids for Christmas as a last minute arrangement, my mother was in hospital following a stroke, I got news of my brother needing medical attention following a fall and news that my uncle is in a very bad way health wise. And we started fostering a SPCA puppy, which was a cute distraction at the end.

Between the report and seminar processes, family issues, two kids on school holidays to entertain in the heat of summer my enthusiasm and drive for this paper became zapped. I think the paper is worthwhile and has great content, but I would never, ever do a summer school paper again. 

Regret is a strong word, but I find myself regretting doing this paper now. It’s been the worst time to do it. But that’s life isn’t it? An ideal time may never present itself anyway. 

It’s been good to learn the ins and outs of effectively writing, albeit in my distracted manner given everything else going on. I know I have a lot more skills to acquire on this front and will take skills from this course as building blocks for future development.

Take home tid bits from this paper include:

1.   Inductive and deductive styles – good to know what they are and how to structure different types of writing in these styles
 
2.       Belbin roles (not sure I’ll remember them all in 15 yrs but the general concept that team members fills different roles I will probably remember)

3.       How important it is to consider the reader/ audience and how that can determine the style of writing you use.

I know I need to work on planning and focus, AND, cracking on with work earlier to alleviate stress and to give contingency for when other areas of my life impede on study life. 

The course is structured well. It takes you nicely through things step by step. In the beginning it felt like information overload and all the communications saying “you should have done this by now” were overbearing. I get the subtle hint concept, but it became daunting to try and keep up with the expectations. 

Personally I’m not a fan of group work, which featured heavily in the course. It’s very challenging when we are all students and in theory on equal footing. In the real world there is a boss/ leader already in place who has the authority. It’s my experience that in student set up groups like this, one or two take over as leader and can be bossy. I was lucky with my group, but still I think group work is fraught with issues and not at all like in the ‘real workforce’. I question the relevance and the hassle of them. I have seen at previous educational facilities how friendships were strained and even ruined following group work. Yes they were 18 year olds fresh out of school, but still!

I feel the peer-review rating should extend over assignments 2 and 3. Just limiting to assignment 2 does not give a fair representation of total participation to all group work. I also feel that all topics from assignment 1 should feature in assignments 2 and 3.

The technical issues with slides and audio not playing correctly was a major annoyance throughout the course. This is something that needs to be rectified or a different method used for future courses.

A big shout out to Pete for his amazing help with super-hero like swift responses to group and personal questions. 

Last blog done - woohoo.