Saturday, July 30, 2011

I keep on checking up . . .



. . . . . but there's still no sign of my results for my Children's Lit course.


Yes, I know! It won't be there until 5th August. But I keep on hoping that it'll mysteriously appear, just for me :/


I don't know why I worry so much about what my EMA score will be. After all, I won't be using my degree for any sort of career purposes - although, this afternoon, a good friend did ask me if I had any intention of trying to write something good enough to be published. 


My first instinct was to deny this. After all, I can't be the only one with file upon file of rejection slips, can I?


But, thinking about it a bit later on, I had to admit to myself that I haven't quite given up my dream of seeing a book I've written in print yet.


When I was young, I used to dream of writing the greatest literary piece ever, but education and life soon taught me that I'm not really up to those sort of standards. But a girl can dream, can't she? Lol


That's not to say that I don't have a chance at all, because I guess I've got as much chance as anyone else, to do something with all the ideas I have floating about in my head.


As a huge Terry Pratchett fan, I've always fancied the idea he put forward, in one of his earlier books, that all the great ideas are sleeting through the universe and, if you happen to be in the right place at the right time, you might be lucky, and get one bumping into your head!


I've have actually written a children's book recently, and my daughter is going to be illustrating it for me, as I love her style of artwork. She came to stay for a few days recently, and we sat discussing the book, and how we both envisage it, and I realised that there was so much more scope, for developing my book, than I might have realised before I took the two Creative Writing courses with the O.U. 
There's also the fact that my last course was a children's lit one, which taught me a lot about how to set out a book, especially one for children.


So, all in all I think, if we can develop this book the way we discussed it, I can't see any reason why I couldn't submit it to a publisher to look at and, you never know, someone might actually like it enough to print it! :)


And in the meantime, I'll keep signing in to student home, in the hope that my result is finally in!



Thursday, July 14, 2011

Off with the old, on with the new . . .

Now that our dear old First Class system is reduced to read only, I find myself missing the busyness of my various favourite forums, which had been saved onto my FC desktop, and so were easily found by accessing FC - which was done with the mere click of a button.
Now, I'm having to negotiate Moodle - a hotchpotch of different pages and links that confuse even the more computer-literate of us, which I'm definitely not!


The biggest problem with this, is accessing the new forums placed on there, which I had been having great trouble finding, ending up going around in circles until I gave up in despair! If it wasn't for a lovely student who was more computer-savvy than I - and many more of us humble students - I'd still be either struggling with the system, or giving up the access to my fellow students, and going it alone, as I'd had to do before getting First Class access in my early years with the Open University. 
But, with her idiot-proof, step-by-step instructions, I eventually worked out how to find all my favourite forums on Moodle, and then save them to links on my Student Page!


For the first time in what seemed like ages, I went through the links yesterday, and caught up with all the news, although I've found that many of my favourite forums are still only lightly used - whether by the fact of holidays, or people finding access to Moodle difficult, we shall have to see - although there have been some comments where some students, because of their various disabilities, are finding the whole thing impossible to negotiate - bad news for those of us left, as we are now missing out on the wisdom, and delight, of some very special contributors to the various forums!


I still have no real idea why the O.U., in their supposed wisdom, decided to change over from FC to Moodle - although I suspect the main reason was financial, as usual :(
I find it ridiculous, though, that a facility that was important to all of us far-flung students, has now been compromised for the sake of penny-pinching!


One of the reasons I stuck with the O.U., was the fact that I could contact, and chat with, students from all over the country, and even all over the world practically, and we were able to discuss both the work we were studying, and also any problems we were facing both with study, and personally, which also put us on a par with students who access brick Unis, when they meet up with their fellow students.


FC had made it possible for our forums to feel like a huge family to me, and I loved that instant access to people who had more than studying in common, especially with all my health problems but, with the Moodle access, there isn't the flexibility for discussion that we had with FC, and this is bound to put off students with more serious problems than my own to cope with.


I feel like Mum and Dad have divorced, and we children are now having to cope with step-parents who, although they still look after us, don't have that same family feeling of caring to back it up.
I feel like we are now all second best to the new-born child of this new family group and, like the child with her nose put out of joint by the newcomer, I don't like it at all :(

Friday, July 01, 2011

Looking to the future . . .



It's the 1st of July, and I'm around 1/4-way into the break between one course and the next. I'm finding it rather like being in limbo, and, although it's giving me time to catch up on the teetering pile of 'to read' books, I'm missing that feeling of  edginess I get when my  TMA is due in, and I've still got tons of studying to do (I'm always at my best when doing things under pressure! :)


I'm feeling a little sad today. Thinking about this next course, my last one to get my BA (Hon), it's made me realise just how much of my life has been taken up with study - not only with the O.U., but also with my Bible study. although, if it wasn't for still having that to do each day, I think I would be screaming with boredom right about now! :)


With all the changes being made into how education is being funded, I don't stand much hope of being able to continue with my study after I get my BA. It would have been nice to be able to continue with an MA in Creative Writing, but, without that funding, I know it's just a pipe dream :(


What I am hoping I can do, is the occasional 10-pointer, provided TPTB don't price it well beyond my financial scopes! As I've done all the ones I was interested in for the Arts section, I'll probably dip my toes into the world of the sciences, and dabble with various fields, to see if I find any of them as interesting as I've found the literature and creative writing to be.


I'll never be a budding scientist,  but it would be nice to discover a little bit more about this amazing world we live on, or even about these bodies we all take so much for granted, until something happens to them! :)


Whatever happens, I can't ever see me giving up on some kind of studying. Even with my hopes for a new world, I see an ever-expanding need for more knowledge, so can't even imagine a reason why I wouldn't be doing something in the learning realm!