I got these results a few weeks ago, MU120 came in at 92%, which was a bit unexpected to be honest as my work rate on the units for this TMA was very low. If I had studied harder it probably wouldn't have taken so long to complete though!

M263 came in at 78% which is my lowest grade so far, however this course is getting TOUGH!! I really am having THE toughest time getting my head around proof. I checked in to the forums on FirstClass the other day and fortunately I don't appear to be the only person finding it hard. On looking at previous exam papers it has barely featured, and where it has you can choose an alternate question so I am not stressing too much..... well enough to spend £5 on passed papers!

(There was a tutorial yesterday to go over proof and recursion, however I was unable to attend, but to be honest I haven't found tutorials that great, we basically sit there and go through examples, and if you don't grasp the concept in the first place it isn't much help!)

I really don't want to throw this course away on the exam, I am determined to get a reasonable score, although I'm not sure if I have done enough assignment wise to get a distinction?? can anyone enlighten me??

On a separate note, my employers have been asking how much they need to budget for 2008/2009 studies and this has got me into the mindset of picking next years courses. I definitely don't plan on studying 90 credits in a year again! But I do find it exciting deciding what to study next. I think it will end up being Java Courses M256 and M257 but the interesting stuff seems to be at level 3 with courses such as Artificial Intelligence really catching my eye.

I'd be interested to hear what others have planned for next year?? For now though I am back to the books..... finish off these Java Classes on M255, which I will say over and over again is the most interesting and enjoyable course I have studied so far!

Its been almost a month to the day since my last blog post, which is very poor on my part, but is due to a combination of life and work and 3 assignments all falling at the same time.

I worked hard on Mu120, which although only being a level one course, I seem to be spending plenty of time on the questions come assignment time (maths never was my strong point). Coupled with the fact that my priorities are definitely toward getting high marks in M263 and M255 my actual study of the MU120 modules has slipped a lot in the last 6 weeks, meaning a lot of catch up and skimming during the assignment period.

The other two assignments are almost at completion, and even though I am only one assignment deep I have come to the conclusion already that M255 is definitely my favourite course so far, one which I recommend to any one interested in studying computing with the OU.

I'll post the scores when I know them.

Due to the popularity of my post about the Yaldex 1st Javascript Editor last year (it has been my most hit page for the last few months) I am going to record some very basic video tutorials about using the software, particularly for debugging for all the M150 students bashing there head against a brick wall come assignment time. This should be done within the next week and will be posted on the blog.

Last weekend saw the completion of TMA02 for M263, taking me to the half way point in the course which I am please about as I haven't found any concept so far overly difficult to understand. I hear the next few units on Proof etc are more complicated but we'll see.

The TMA was quite a long one, consisting of 8 questions and taking a decent amount of time to complete. The TMA had a large volume of coding surrounding it, which I enjoyed doing (when the workpad was playing along) however, the OU like you to include all source code in the TMA document as well as seperate text files, which leads to a decent sized document for submission.

I assume its an anti-plaigarism tactic, allowing there software to scan the contents of the .doc file while the Tutor marking the assignment can run the source code from text.

I began to heavily anotate my course handbook with examples of any ideas I was finding myself referencing directly from the cours texts during the TMA. (My one fear with this course is that there is going to be an awful lot to remember for the exam). We are allowed to take the course handbook into the exam so it makes sense to clarify any ideas that you know you may forget by exam time directly next to there reference in the handbook, and I would definitely recommend people do it whilst working through TMA's as they cover all of the Key Ideas of the course.

Thats all for now, hopefully I will be able to report back a decent TMA score shortly, for now I need to crack on with my amphibious worlds (M255).

Results are in! A respectable 90%, silly mistakes as ever to lose the marks, will I ever learn?! One thing I have learnt is to go by your instincts, if you believe the logic in your answer is right go with it! (Unfortunately due to not trusting myself I have amended answers only to lose marks).

The second bit of good news is I have a completion date of Friday for my new house which is quick so I'm going to have a busy christmas break.

I have also tried the 'Blog readability test' which was brought to my attention by Simon Knights and Ian Macey which rated the education level required to read my blog as High School.... so your all safe ;-) ..... for now.

Merry Christmas

Simon

I have been hard at work on my MU120 TMA01 PT1 which I have completed today, I must admit this was more of a pain than I thought it would be! All was running well until I hit question 2 part D, where I got stuck on something which happened to be straightforward but took me a fair amount of time to solve. I can't discuss the question at the moment as the TMA deadline has not passed but section 1.7 in the calculator book should give people a good grounding in tackling the question.

Now the TMA is complete I have two gripes. The first is that I cannot submit it electronically, which isn't a massive issue but it is an annoyance as up until now I have submitted all my TMA's in this way. The OU put it down to Maths being much easier to work with on paper than on the PC, which after spending a good 5 minutes trying to find out how to use superscript for the squared symbol in Microsoft word I realised is probably true. My second gripe is that you cannot search the PDF texts for this course. I know a lot of students like to work from textbooks but I personally enjoy the freedom of PDFs and the ease of reference come TMA time. Unfortunately as I learned today the old nose in the book and search method has to be used now and again, this is because the MU120 texts are written using a special piece of software to deal with all the mathematical characters which when converted to PDF, is unsearchable (Arrgghh!).

My M263 TMA was handed in earlier last week and I found it fairly straight forward however some of the information in Unit 1 threw me a bit as they were using operators without fully explaining them. The text does stress that it will expand as the course continues and I hope it does, seems a lot of effort learning a new language for a year, you'd think they would continue using javascript which is used in other OU courses including the M150 course which so many people start there computing degrees with.

I've just been to my first tutorial of this academic year. We went through the MU120 course materials and workloads/assignments and what is expected of us as students. Seems the same as previous years however my tutor did stress that MU120 is fairly time consuming for a 30 point course and don't judge your time based on previous study. Point noted!

The first part of TMA01 is due on the 22nd of October and as with all TMA's in MU120 needs to be submitted by snail mail. The Dark Ages! (Que medieval music).

This seems to be a bit of a pain as it will reduce the amount of time I have to write the TMA and check it before posting it, as in my past experiences I have been able to check a TMA a few times before submitting it via the eTMA system without to much worry of blowing a deadline. I guess I just have to plan it better.

The materials seem to be fine at the moment, and I'm keeping on track as far as studying goes.

On a different note I don't have a tutorial for M263 until November, and if I recall correctly its down in Exeter which is going to be a bit of a nightmare. I'm enjoying reading the materials for this course so far however it does seem to jump straight in at a fast pace and using technical terminology. It is a level 2 course though, I just hope we'll all be able to keep up!

Well,
after working my way through the MU120 mathematics preperatory materials and hearing that M263 is predominantly maths based course I have chosen to postpone M255 until Febraury. To be honest I know maths isn't necessarily my strongest point and to give myself the fairest chance of passing my courses to a good standard (M263 counts towards degree classification) I want to be able to dedicate all my time to M263 and MU120.

It was a bit of a relief to get it sorted, as the last 3 weeks I have spent alot of time worrying about my workload and the thought of my first two courses which contain final exams running directly in parallel. I hope I have made the right decision... time will tell though.

I thought I would drop by as I haven't wrote an entry since my courses finished for the summer.

The good news is I received my end of course assessment back for M150 and scored 89% which I'm very pleased with. This hopefully will secure a pass for the course however I still have to await the return of the final CMA.

I have also received my registration agreements through for M263 (£355), MU120(£315) and M255(£355). After applying for financial support I managed to secure a partial grant which will cover all of MU120's costs and some of M263's. I approached my employer today regarding the remaining balance for my courses and they were more than happy to pay, which leaves me in a very fortunate position of not having to pay any fees this year.

I'm off around Europe in a few days time and will be spending 5 weeks on the continent which I am really looking forward too. It will be good to recharge the batteries before returning in August ready for a September start and another year with the OU.

I have been keeping up to date with other OU students blogs and I have been pleased to receive comments on both the ISIC card and and my blog in general so thank you to all those who have stopped by!

I hope you all have a great summer and a well deserved rest (and that the weather takes a turn for the better too!)

Bye for now.

Good afternoon

As I am coming around to the end of my first year with the OU I have decided to write about where I am heading and what I intend to study.
For the first year of my degree I studied two 30 credit level 1 courses. These were T175 Networked Living: Exploring Information and Communication and M150 Data, Computing and Information.

I have found both of these courses thoroughly engaging and enjoyable and they have provided a really good broad base for my future studies in computing. I have found M150 more challenging and rewarding than T175 however this is mainly because I am from a programming background and it is the route I want to persure. T175 is a newer course and the materials are probably presented in a nicer way.

My Degree (B29 BSc(Hons) Computing) should in accordance with OU recommendations, be studied over 6 years at 60 credits per year. I have followed this path for the first year however I am going to step my study up to 90 credits next year with the aim of completing my degree two years early.

The 90 credits I am going to study over the next 12 months are the level 1 course MU120 Open Mathematics, the level 2 courses M263 Building Blocks of Software and M255 Object Orientated Programming with Java.

I found my first year very manageable and hopefully 90 credits should not but overly stretching myself. At the moment though I am looking forward to having the summer off when I will be travelling around Europe for 5 weeks. I look forward to properly blogging these courses as I study them and offering any ideas and suggestions as I go.

Simon