So who's exhausted? Writing this concepts assignment has been a time consuming and difficult affair and I wonder who else would have found it all easier if we could have written twice as much on two concepts as opposed to 500 words each on four concepts. Funny how it seems to take twice as long to write half as much eh? I don't get it really but I think the reason is that 500 words is so restrictive. I put my assignment together using this process:
- read and investigate
- formulate some ideas of which way I want to go (I tended to adapt the concept to "my world")
- jot down a very basic list
- start writing
- read some more
- finish the assignment section
- decide what sites to put in the annotated bibliography
- change my mind and then find some more sites
- go in and adjust the assignment section if necessary
- write the annotations
- have a beer followed by a glass of red ;)
I saw a tweet from the ever helpful and fantastic @amyty (which I took to mean was) about spending a lot of time finding a reference to fit in to her concept assignment and it sparked a conversation here with my wife (who is studying Physiotherapy at UniSA) about this practice. (sorry in advance @amyty if I misinterpreted your tweet but this is more about my interpretation than what you may have been trying to get across). Anyway, my wife said she has a uni colleague who always looks for references to back up her ideas rather than reading and investigating first and then writing about the ideas generated. My wife seemed to think that this meant that her friend learnt less because she was finding references to support her prior thinking and learning. So is this method detrimental to learning?
Well my thoughts are that sometimes you just need to support your ideas. Sure, if you write an assignment without reading and investigating and then cobble together some references to support them you will end up with a pretty disjointed bit of writing. But if you are using this practice as an add on to your pre-assignment reading, then it could be beneficial to the process. I guess in some ways this method was evidenced in my concepts assignment with the choice of site to include in the annotated bibliography. I did tend to change my assignment so I think that this aided in my learning rather than using it to support my previously held beliefs.
Love to hear what you all think.....
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3 comments:
Oh yes, that was a tough one. But as it's unrelated to this entry I won't explain it. Suffice to say, 'it's not what you think'.
It has, however, sparked an interest in researching what hasn't been thoroughly researched. At least not by any credible sources, as evidenced by the fact that I couldn't find anything.
What's wrong with an original approach in an assignment, anyway?
I'm undecided about how I feel about you referencing me, afterall.
Hi Rhys,
Thanks for visiting my blog, I have trouble finding references for "invisibility of Difference" when doin the concepts assignments, you may notice my last post has an indirect reference from the article and is dated 7th feb 2009, after submission date. It would have been nice if you left a comment about it, seing as you took the time to read it.
Also doing the search module 4 after the assignments didn't help the proccess either.
My approach to the concepts assignments was to read and research, write, read and reference, write some more, then realise I stuffed the whole thing and write a poem lol.
BTW i didn't mind having 4 shorter essays (though just writing a poem would have been more ideal for me to indicate my understanding of the concepts, I'm not good at essay writing), in this instance broader knowledge of wider areas is more valuable than specific knowledge confined to a certain area of study.
Jamie
My style is to read a few general summaries then to have a look through the literature, gauge what's going on and then start to write, finding sources to back up particular points as I was making them.
This assignment, however, I treated a bit like a reflection diary and discussed my thoughts, why I thought like that and what it means when we are communicating online, and in real life.
If you have done a bit of study and are an educated person then I see no problem with simply looking for papers to support your position, and due to the search process you are likely to come across people who think differently to you but still use the same key words. So you will be exposed to a range of opinions.
Saying that though, the thing I always get marked down for is not having a strong enough opinion in my assignments, I am a notorious fence sitter because I don't believe in absolutes and think everything is context dependent.
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