A story of survival

Today i attended an exhibition at the NEC on learning and development which was interesting enough but what really sparked my interest of course was this Routemaster bus! RML2300 is now owned (or operated) by a company who organise team building and the like but has had a long life of course like all surviving Routemasters, i found this photo of it on Flickr dated 1978.

Starting my MOOC

I started my first MOOC today (Massive Open Online Course), which is the University of Applied Sciences in Potsdam's Future of Storytelling course. The first set of video lectures were interesting and i hope the rest of the course over the next few weeks follows suit. I am interested in this course both for my own creative projects and also as it could be useful for possible future jobs, you never know.

Although not directly relevant to a web developer job (for example) there will likely be elements of the course that are helpful just as my History courses proved in areas like research skills and writing. Of course an outsider (such as a manager...) might not be able to appreciate how it could be relevant but things you learn and skills you develop can have beneficial side-effects elsewhere in unexpected ways.

I also completed my latest Lynda course on jQuery anyway. Its been a multi-disciplinary day!

Dipping a toe in the MOOC waters

MOOCs or Massive Open Online Courses are pretty big now. They are university courses offered free to everyone with an internet connection. A few friends have taken such courses and i thought it was time i tried one too so i have enrolled on the very interesting sounding Future of Storytelling Course offered by the Potsdam University of Applied Sciences via iversity.

It lasts for a few weeks but shouldn't get in the way of the "day job" academic wise (i have plenty of free time at the moment anyway!) This course isn't related to my masters in any way but may be useful for career purposes and general interest as i do quite a lot of writing online. If the course works out there are a few others starting in early 2014 i have also got my eye on.

If thats not enough i've got a free trial on the Lynda software training site too and i'm trying to get the most out of that improving my career focussed skills as they are lagging badly in many areas. Seems a better way to spend my time during the Winter months than on Facebook anyway.

Micro-teach

The culmination of my PTLLS (Preparation for Teaching in the Life Long Sector) course is a micro-teach. A 20 minute long mini-teaching session that has to be properly planned and assessed. This morning i did my micro-teach to an audience of 16 people, the subject of which ties into my Masters as i did it on searching historical archives and handling primary sources.

A fairly dry subject for the layman perhaps but i wanted to do something like that instead of making up something funky. Maybe i'll be a history teacher one day, you never know. Anyway my micro-teach went fine, i was a little nervous but didn't fall apart and improved as the session went on. There are aspects i need to improve on but overall i was satisfied.

Preparing for a micro-teach

I have my time and date now for my micro-teach, next Wednesday morning. The micro-teach is a 20 minute teaching session and is the culmination of my PTLLS course. I am going to do it on searching historic archives, something i have done quite a bit of over the last few months.

According to my session plan i am going to do a presentation for 6 minutes or so, unfortunately when i did my first run through the presentation the timer i had set went off long before i reached the end. I have amended my presentation now and have put in a group activity (for kinaesthetic learners natch) which can be a bit flexible time wise.

Now all i need to do is practice practice practice, my wife is so going to enjoy the weekend.

The demise of the (printed) Encyclopedia Britannica

The Encyclopedia Britannica is to cease publication of a printed edition after 244 years and go digital only. In 1979 my parents bought for me a set of the books assured by the salesman (who gave us a nice slideshow) that it would be a worthwhile investment both in me and financially as the books would never lose their value. They were not cheap though i was too young to understand such things at the time but it must have cost my parents a sizeable chunk of their salaries to get it for me (we've never been a rich family).

I still have it now though have barely opened a volume for years. While i was at school it was opened now and then but did not prove that useful for school work. I did use it fruitfully for some private research, i remember reading up on a number of Native American Tribes and on European countries. Nowadays if i want to look something up i use Wikipedia like anyone else (and of course then check up the references to make sure!)

But it has kept its value of course... or has it? Actually no. One of my volumes did have some minor printing errors (a few pages getting mangled) which was not noticed by anyone for years so a few years ago i had a look on Ebay to see how much it would cost to get that volume again. To my shock the entire set of volumes (the same edition and bounding i had) was on sale for... £60! It would have cost my parents the equivalent of a few £1000s back in the late 70s and early 80s so one cannot say its kept its value.

Still it looks good on the shelves... though i am running out of shelf space. I won't get rid of it though, it was the gift of knowledge even if i never used it and sought my knowledge elsewhere myself.

MA Day school

Today i attended the first day school of my current Open University course (which is an MA in History of course), the day school was at the OU's HQ in Milton Keynes. This was the first time i had been there, indeed the first time i had been to MK! An interesting if slightly strange place to be sure, both the campus and MK! I of course got lost on my day to the day school (well its traditional for me, i just wonder how it is possible for someone to have such a lack of a sense of direction!)

The day school was good, though tiring, and i had a nice chat with my tutor. Unfortunately at the train was delayed coming back home due to some overhead line problems nearly Wembley (though in the end my train was only delayed 30 minutes). That meant i had time to have a surreal chat with a dopehead on the train platform, he was on the run from the police for breaking his bail conditions because he couldn't go back home because his girlfriend (who seemed also pretty drugged up) had burnt all his clothes and stabbed him. He was looking to go to Wales to hide, though got on a train for Glasgow. I think he was too high to really care one way or the other!

A new adventure begins

Next month will mark a year since my final exam of my BA History with the Open University, and as that degree is safely out of the way (i got a 2:1) its time to move onto the MA...

I registered for the course back in April ready for a start in October, that did seem a long way away when i registered but now i am just a few weeks away and yesterday i received my course materials... and there seems to be a lot to read!

Hopefully i don't have to read all of it as there is a choice of module later on in the course, this part of my MA will be a 15 month course too not a 8 month one like the BA modules were. Maybe i'll make a start with reading the introduction at least at the weekend.

My graduation

Finally i have attended an awards or graduation ceremony! I had 2 chances while i was a student at UCE but missed it both times (the first time by choice, the second time an error) so i was determined to make it third time lucky at the awards ceremony for the BA Honours in History i got last December with the Open University.

I've had to wait awhile for all the gowning business to take place but it all went smoothly. Now i await the start of my MA in October, maybe i will be back at Birmingham's Symphony Hall for another awards ceremony in a few years time...

Flash

I have had a busy week. For a start there has been a huge amount of TV that i have struggled to keep up with. Two episodes of The Apprentice and two Eurovision semi-finals ate up a lot of my evenings. I have more or less caught up now with everything anyway.

To add to my busyness i have been on a Adobe Flash training course the last couple of days at the NTI. Its been a long time coming, i think i first asked about being allowed to go on such a course 3 or 4 years ago. Better late than never though of course there is a lot of noise about Flash being old skool and HTML5 taking over. Well that won't happen for some time yet and the installed base for Flash is huge so i suspect i will have the chance to try out my newly learned skills. Flash isn't quite as old as COBOL and thats still going around, i can write in that too incidentally.

Its nice to get out of the office and learn something new. To be honest this is probably the first formal computer training i've had since i graduated in Software Engineering 15 years ago! Since then i've had to learn a lot of new stuff but its always been on the job, its good to learn something new without the pressure of deadlines and impending death if i fail.

NTI is a great venue, their coffee is a lot better than the stuff we have in the office too though urine from the last leper in Hell probably is better as well to be honest.

Masters

After months of "umming" and "ahhing" i have finally made a decision about my future academic career and signed up for a Masters degree... actually no that is a lie i knew it was going to do MA History with the Open University at least a month ago but just didn't get around to actually signing up for it! Still thats done now and i shall be a student again on the 1st of October (assuming they accept me and i can't see why not).

I think it will take about 3 years to do the Masters, half the time it took me to get my 2:1 BA Honours with them but i guess it will all be at a higher level without the need for the introductory stuff but i am ready. This was my long term goal really when i started my OU career over 6 years ago, BA, MA and then PhD? And then have my own history programme on Channel 5. Well maybe not the latter.

I am looking forward to it though maybe not the TMAs again and the dissertation i will have to do eventually i shall try and keep from my mind for now.

I'm also going to have some Flash training for work next month at the NTI. Of course Flash is kind of yesterday's news but i have requested this training for years so its better late than never!

Pondering my future academic options

In December i completed a BA in History with the Open University as you may or may not know but you should know as i basically have told anyone and everyone. There are Stone Age tribes in the Amazon untouched by the decadence of Western civilisation who know. The graduation ceremony is all booked and set for June, i have the certificate already. It has been framed and is on my wall. But now i need to make a decision about what i am going to do about my studies next.

I am likely to continue with the OU and do their history masters but i have been looking at a number of other universities including Birmingham. Their distance learning MAs though either arn't quite what i want to do or i can't find out enough about them. (I tell you looking at university web sites as a prospective student is a lot different from looking at them for a living...)

The OU course does not begin until October but i think i need to register soon so i can prepare myself, preparatory reading and so on. I have decided to make my final decision on April 1st. No joke!

My only real concern (apart from the fees though i can afford it) is what the step-up is from a BA to an MA. Is there a big leap or should a graduate be ready to progress to the next stage?