Nearly christmas

It's the last week before we break up from college, it's a rush at the moment to hand in any outstanding work that we have for any teachers. We have a deadline for the last bits of work, so far I have kates to finish off, bernies merit to finish and guys assignment to finish off. We break up on thursday so I have 3 days left to wrap everything up! I have recently got myself a job which I work on fridays and saturdays, it's taking up alot of my study time so I am having to fit in as much hours as I can, both in lessons and out in order to catch up with everything. I am hoping to get everything cleared up before we break up.

Tutorial and extras!

This morning in tutorial we have been going over job advertisements, the tutors have given the class a job advertisement basing around an I.T Technician job. After scanning through the job advertisement we was made to write up a covering letter as in the space of 20 minutes to see what we could come up with. At the moment they are reviewing what we have written, should be interesting.

Putting the tutorial aside, I have been looking into universities as I am going to have to start applying throughout the next year. This weekend I have been talking it other with my dad who put forward several universities in Holland that are dropping in Fees. Apparently there are 7 universities grouping together in order to lower the initial fees to join the college, also considering the currency is different in Holland so the overall price is looking to be around £5000-£6000. Better news is that the universities are full of English teachers, which makes it more of an interesting area to look into.

During the next year I am hoping to apply for one of these universities!

Up to date

Currently sitting in Bernies lesson finishing up on work, finally I've finished off any outstanding work for bernies unit giving me a bit of time to catch up on my blog. The assignment I just finished was based around gaming computers, finding out the specifications & how well they perform. With the results of the specifications we had to compare them to the latest games up to date (2011) and show how well they can perform with these games. As such I've just finished off the last bit of the assignment & lending a hand to students who are struggling with the merit task. Untill I get my work back I have no work to do, I am waiting for the arrival of the next assignment, which I think will be given from guy shortly. We are covering on how to set up and potentially 'break' a network, taking screenshots of the process as we go along. In the mean time, I am going to be studying for the upcoming assignments so I am prepared for the work so I dont fall behind.

Tutorial

For out tutorial we have been going over the amount of progress that we have made over the last 8 weeks. At the moment we are creating spreadsheets in order to keep track of what grades we are achieving as well as the grades we are not achieving. It's basically just to keep in order of how much work we must finish off, so far everything looks fine, the tracking grid (a spreadsheet that shows our current passes/merits/distinctions) Is still being updated. As such we still dont know our full grades so far, however due to assignments being handed in recently, the tracking grid will still need to be updated. Throughout the week I will find out what grades I am getting on my assignments as I see each individual teacher.

Presentation - Kate

After completing the pass and merit criterias for Kates assignment (regarding written work) we have been prompt to create a presentation which is a part of the pass criteria. The presentation can be based on anything the person wants, so it can be a hobby or something they have accomplished, anything that they can use to inform the members of the group with a structured presentation. For the presentation I chose to stick to the criteria on the assignment brief which is to do with 'interpersonal skills' basically this is regarding to how we communicate with other people i.e. eye contact, gestures etc. These are considered 'skills' and are essential to have an effective conversation with another person. The presentation I created had around 8 slides, I chose to not follow any notes as I understood how interpersonal skills work, in effect I simply chose 8 topics regarding to interpersonal skills and simply spoke to the class about what I knew on each individual topic, eventhough the presentation was based on the powerpoint, I took the class away from the slideshow and focused them on a group talk, it helps keep the audience interested as you are making eye contact aswell as not having your back turned to them. Overall I believe the presentation turned out alright, it seemed to keep people somewhat interested, considering I had no notes and simply spoke about each topic off the top of my head, I was happy with the end result.

It's been about 3 weeks since our assignments have been given to us, from: Guy, Kate and Bernie. Each unit is based around a different area within the I.T industry, so far we are studying:

Communication skills - Kate
Hardware and software - Bernie
Networks - Guy

In total we have 2 assignments from bernie, 1 from kate and 1 from guy. I am going for Distinctions on any assignment given, it's taking alot more time however, in the long run the extra knowledge will benefit me when I progress into a career. The assignments criterias have been broken up over the few weeks for example, as a class we will complete the pass criteria with a specific deadline and so forth with the merit and distinction criteria, it helps break off the stress of the amount of work.

27/09/2011 - Into the second week of college

College so far seems alright, we are gradually being brought into each unit. As of yet we haven't really been given any assignments, most of the work is just preparation  for when the assignment is submitted to us. The lessons so far are slightly re-jogging my memory from last year, so it's easier to take in information, however the depth of the topics we are talking about are alot more intricate. It's going to take around 3-4 weeks before the work begins rolling in, so taking as much notes and being prepared for them is going to be essential if I am wanting to get the work done efficiently.

Briefing the first assignments.

All the groups are currently attending the same lesson, usually everyone is split up throughout different groups (X,Y,Z for example.) We have just briefed the first assignment for the year which is unit 1. Unit 1 is based around the employment side of I.T such as 'what characteristics for employers look for in people etc.' this first assignment is called 'Communication and Employability Skills for IT' so the assignment is basically asking us to write reports to guides on how communication within IT can be effective and then elaborating on it through tasks given to us on the assignment.

One of the pass tasks for this assignment is, well, writing this blog. So I have to write up 12 blog entries throughout each day/week of college.

My experience of college so far is alright, the class seems easy going the teachers are pretty easy to get along with, our timetable was given to us the other day (Fridays off!) Everything so far seems to be pretty good.

BTEC I.T Practitioners system support Level 3 - Introduction

Hi, my name is Jamie Senior I am a returning student who has successfully completed the previous course (BTEC Level 2.) Throughout the 2 years that I will be spending at college I will be posting frequent updates from my experiences at Northampton college upon studying this course, which I hope will give some insight to what this course entails and hoping that those who wish to study this course will gain a large interest to study in this area of work.
12/09/2011
Monday - Induction day

Today was an induction day to settle the students into their groups, we have been shown what units we will be studying for the next 2 years and the units we will be studying throughout the first year. From being a student from last year, the induction was nothing new the usual health and safety regulations etc. We have been given our timetables so we have an idea of what units and what teachers we are going to have for the next couple of months, we don't start our course fully until next Monday 19/09/2011. Upon having our introduction today the level 3 course differs majorly then the previous year, the workload is more demanding and the deadlines for handing in work has become more strict. Our tutor explained to us to what we will roughly be doing this year, for example we will be building networks, breaking them and then finding a remedy and diagnosis for the problem involved. There will be plenty of work regarding software and hardware, everything will be in alot more detail than what the previous year consisted of. The next 2 years may prove to be both demanding and challenging, however this course will enable us to gain an A level or A levels which is a step up towards going to university. I will be keeping an update on what I am being taught frequently as progress throughout the course.