Tuesday, December 23, 2008

holy .....ummmm..... I mean merry ....

Here is the truth: I have been participating in this course at uni. Open University via Curtin to be precise. And. Well. I've also been travelling. Travelling in two senses of the word.

I have driven from Adelaide to Brisbane. I am writing this in Brisbane at my folks house where I grew up. So back to the uni part. I have been participating in online discussions, reading blogs and doing tasks. The same stuff as anyone reading this probably has. I have also been catching up with family, cycling around Western Plains Zoo, reading blogs, stressing about concepts (you who know what I mean, KNOW WHAT I MEAN) And that brings me to the other journey.

I have been travelling along on the blogadrine trail. Blogadrine is the hit you get from receiving comments. Participating in conversation and making choices. I don't think it's a word but I am coining it now if it is not. Blogadrine, it's addictive. You write a post, you wait for the comment, you comment back. The cycle can be unerring. I am certain I am not the first one to say that it is an ego kick. Having work published the minute you write it and read instantly and feedback received is awesome.

But here is the reality kick. I gotta write a heap of stuff about concepts. OK that aint so bad, What scares me is the academic stuff. I gotta write like stuff with quotes and stuff? And an anotiamated bibliomographamy. Crap. the onion is peeling away now. The skin is being shed and the core will soon be revealed. Please you experienced academia types, come with me and help me with my assignment!!!!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was wondering why you had been quiet on the blog front. I am sure the drive from Adelaide to Brisbane would have given you plenty of time to reflect on concepts.

But why the panic. Surely you are nit intimidated by bibliography and annotation. Spare a though for some of us oldies, who need to work out the difference between Chicago referencing as used in NED11 and APA style used in this unit.
AArg, why can't institutions have a consistent standard?

Anonymous said...

Seasons greeting to you to Rhys!

Glad to hear your journey from south to north was safe and hopefully now you are enjoying your time with your family.

I'm feeling it with you regarding the concepts assignment. I have found though that couple have jumped out at me while completing the initial tasks. Time away from the interwebs has also allowed me to reflect on a few things and pointed me in a couple of interesting directions. I suppose now only time will tell if those directions will be the right ones.

On the more academic side of things, I thought I better get a grip on some stuff so I sought out this excellent resource on APA style referencing. Hope it helps mate.

KTA said...

I will be no help to you on the academia front. I used to be OK with essays and stuff, but lets be honest... I haven't exactly tried to write one in a looooong time. I haven't even picked my concepts yet... I've narrowed it down to about 10, but I'm not sure if I'm taking the "easy" ones or if its just the ones that appeal to me seem to be "easier"... we should start a forum specifically for the woes of this concept assignment, lol...

Peter Fletcher said...

You're going to be just fine. Break the task down into bite sized chunks and write as if you didn't have a backspace key. Remember, you can edit s*&t but you can't edit nothing. If you're not using EndNote consider doing so. Always happy to help.

Peter

PS Just had to throw "blogadrine" onto Twitter. Of course I attributed it to you.

Anonymous said...

Wow, I wish I'd had time to worry about the concepts assignment, some people get all the time!

Trust me, you will be fine if you are starting to think about it now, I have around 6 assignments due in between now and this one (I'm starting to think 4 subjects was a mistake, next semester I am sticking to 2).

You are always welcome to send assignments over to your fellows to edit for spelling etc, though the style might have to be something you work on over time.

RhysatWork said...

Folks, thanks for your words of encouragement here.

Hans, I'm not panicking yet but I soon will. A big break has left me bumbling about in the forums wondering WTF happened...

Simon, Thanks for the link! tres helpful ;)

@KTA, have you started a forum on this yet? I will have to troll throgh the 100 odd posts still to be read :(

Peter, hmmm I will remember that one. Write something first, edit second ;) thanks for the twitter plug maybe one day that word will be used the world over heheheh

Claire, good luck with your assignments!!

Happy new year all.