New beginnings…

Well, come Saturday, I’ll be starting my next Open University course! I finished the last one, Creative Writing, at the beginning of June and I spent most of the summer pondering which course to do next…although at the back of my mind I knew that it would be the one I’ve chosen to do – Children’s Literature. It should be an interesting one…fingers crossed. The course material arrived a week or so ago but I had yet to open the package, til now that is. I was reluctant to open it for some reason, probably because I was slightly nervous at the prospect of another year’s study.

I’m pleased to say though, that I’m pleasantly happy with what the package contained It includes: a study guide that takes you through the course week by week, which contains all the activities you need to complete and also some reading extracts that accompany the activities; two study books to go along with the study guide; two DVDs containing “a variety of audiovisual material including performances of children’s literature, and interviews with children, authors and publishers” (may need to get some help with these as I’m unsure if they’ll have subtitles or not…); a book – ‘Peter Pan and Other Plays’ by J.M.Barrie; and a course guide, which explains each part of the course. Phew! It all looks pretty exciting though and I’m genuinely looking forward to starting now, whereas before I was feeling a mixture of trepidation and nervousness! Silly me.

I’m hoping that I’ll enjoy this course, as the last one began to stifle me a bit. I do enjoy writing but I’ve learnt that I prefer to do it by myself and keep it to myself, rather than writing something that I know has to be marked at the end…for me it blocked my creativity a little. It was the first time that I had my creative writing analysed and thoroughly marked – before that it was only at GCSE level at secondary school and the marking system isn’t as tough as it is at University level, obviously! I’m guessing that the Children’s Literature course will mainly be built upon analysing books and poetry aimed at children, and looking at how it can aid their development, whilst also studying the history of children’s literature and how it has evolved. Uh huh, I think I’m definitely looking forward to this one.

About two weeks ago, I finally got started on my way to achieving my Level 2 in BSL (British Sign Language). I’ve been talking about it for quite a few years but have never gotten started. I did try when I was in my last year at secondary school but the GCSE exams got in the way and took all my attention. For me, it’s mainly a case of honing my signing and polishing it ready for the exams. There’s three exams in total, each one different from the other. The first exam involves watching a video of someone signing a story in BSL, and at intervals they will pause the story and ask you four questions about the story – all in BSL of course – and then you have to mark your answer on a sheet of paper with multi-choice answers. The point of this exam is to remember the details from the story, such as remembering which pocket the person took their phone out of – either their shirt pocket or the pocket in their jeans – which will prove to the examiner that you can process BSL correctly and hold the information that you’ve been given. There’s no signing from you in this exam, it’s just a video/paper exam. We’ll be sitting the first exam in mid December so we’ve still got time to practice and scrub the memory sections of our brains! Eeek.

I’ve been looking into becoming a Level 1 BSL tutor again…and it’s not quite as confusing as I thought it was. Basically, if you’re going to be teaching post-16 level, you just need to be a qualified teacher but not in the sense that you need to get a PGCE and all that. Which was the confusing bit. You just need to get an award called ‘Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector’, PTLLS for short and then you have to get another qualification that is suited to the role you’ll be undertaking. Then you’ll need to be fluent/knowledgeable in the subject area you’ll be teaching, in my case, Level 1 BSL. I’m not sure how long it’ll take to be fully trained but I’m just relieved that it’s not quite as complicated as it seemed when I researched it before. For now it’s a possible option…watch this space!

I think new beginnings can be scary, but once you’ve taken those first few steps, the scaryness starts to fall away and you can tread your path confidently. Just got to take those first few steps.

One foot forward…

How do we put one foot forward in this world? I find myself confused, again. It’s strange, because realistically, I know there are probably many lines of work I could go into…but I’m not seeing the options very clearly right now. All I can see is a life-time of work…until the age of 60/65, when we retire. I’m starting to wonder, what’s the point of education (further education), if it isn’t relevant to the work you do? It’s as if employers want to have evidence that you’re “clever”…but it doesn’t really matter what subject you’ve graduated in! And they also want you to have “previous experience”…well, how will we get that experience if every place wants you to have experience?! The world of work seems to be a confusing one…and I’ve yet to join the job-hunt yet!

Sure, I’m doing voluntary work, but I don’t think I want to go into teaching. Maybe that’s what “experience” is though? Voluntary work? If you can’t get an actual foot on the career ladder, maybe the first step is to do voluntary work…? I’m not sure.

I feel like I’m a “free-spirit”…and I’m not sure how I will feel once I settle down into a daily, 9-5 kind of job. I get the feeling that I wouldn’t enjoy it, unless it was something creative, something different, challenging…but really, what is out there?! From watching my sister getting more and more disheartened, it’s making me wonder and worry about looking for a job myself. I’m wondering what the world of work has to offer.

I know that the WORLD has a lot to offer, it has an amazing amount to offer…but does it offer it through work? The state of society, of commercialism, worries me. I’m trying to judge what society’s attitudes towards deafness is, in our day and age. Will I have to put up a fight to get where I want to be? Will it be a constant struggle? Or will I be lucky enough to find a group of people to work with who are accepting, who are deaf-aware? I know one thing though, I won’t find out the answers to any of those questions until I put myself out there.

On the other hand, maybe I should look at the world of work as an adventure? It’s a new path to go down; and for the most part, you are in control – nothing is compulsory until you enter into a job. You can pick the job. If that makes sense?!

And now…I think I shall start the hunt…wish me luck… I shall blog about what I find!

When I grow up…(pt. 2!)

Right then, the other day I did a post entitled “When I grow up…”…and now I shall lead on from that topic with a new response! On Thursday and Friday, I worked at the Primary school…and the result wasn’t exactly what I was expecting!! I thought it would be challenging but I found myself feeling differently.

I was working in the Reception (ages 4-5), and it’s the first year of school. Some say that this year is the hardest to teach because you’re helping them to get started on their academic life; it’s the first step, you learn to count, you learn the alphabet…you learn through play. Play. Maybe that’s the problem?! Because a lot of the time, it just felt like I was “supervising” their play. I know this probably sounds quite rude, but it was just too boring for me. Maybe I should give it a few more weeks, because it is early days and I need to build up a relationship with the children, but I just find myself thinking that maybe I spoke too soon about wanting to be a ToD?

My earlier doubts about whether it’s something I want to do could be ringing true here. I’m a very creative person – I love writing, photography, art…but I’m also the kind of person who gets bored quite quickly, I need to have variety in life, in jobs, so that I always keep an interest in what I’m doing. I was one of those kids who used to watch Art Attack on TV…start making the projects and then rarely finish them! That’s not to say I won’t stick something out and finish the job in question; I just need a lot of stimulation I guess. Right now, it feels a bit like I’m back at square one: trying to figure out what I want to do in the future in terms of careers.

I just think, and I’ve said this before, my generation is a very confused one. We don’t actually know WHAT we want, unless we’ve decided on something and follow it until we’ve achieved it…if that makes sense? Some people just find what they want to do early on and keep on with it. Others, well, it’s more difficult. Part of the problem could be that there’s so much on offer out there, there are so many different career paths to go into…but which one to go into is the more difficult decision! For most people, they have career advisers at school, or “options” advisers…and they help you to a certain point, they help you decide what you want to do after GCSEs…after A-Levels…but then you’re on your own. Or, that’s what it feels like. Sure, you can go to centres (like Connexions) that can advise you; but how many of us actually go? How many of us actually seek out the help when we need it? I don’t know, maybe a lot of people do, but most of the people I know don’t. They try to figure it out themselves. Like I’m doing right now.

I’m okay, I’ve got my course, I’m volunteering…I’ve got my family, friends, the boy… All I need, I’ve got. But the one thing I want is an aim. I don’t like going through the days aimlessly, without an ultimate goal. Perhaps I’ll change my mind? Maybe I’ll decide in a few weeks time that I do actually want to be a ToD…? But right now it doesn’t look very promising. I don’t know; maybe I COULD be a writer…but I’m quite critical of my own work, I don’t have very much confidence in my writing sometimes. I’m not confident enough to say “Actually, maybe I could be a professional writer.” To be a writer, you need to be inspired to write; sometimes I don’t have that inspiration. I have the inspiration to take photographs, I love to capture the world around me, I love capturing moments in time so that you can keep them forever; but when it comes to writing, I need a bit more of a push to get going at times. Maybe I should just try to do some free-writes every day, as I find that normally helps to get my creative juices flowing.

I think some people just have a calling, they have something that they feel they are destined to do. Some people have many callings. The other day my mum said to me that the young generation of today, on average they’ll go through about 15 different jobs/careers in their lives. In today’s society, maybe that’s the way it is? Yes, some people will stick at one or two things throughout their lives; others may try many different things. Which do you think you fit into? For me, it may be the latter because, as I’ve said, I’m someone who gets bored if I do something for too long. I guess, for me to be fully happy, I need a job that will offer me a lot of stimulation, a lot of different things to do…something that is never the same. I thought I’d find that with children, as experience has shown me; but maybe it’s different in a school environment? I don’t know. I’m a little confused at the moment, as you can probably tell!

When I grow up…

When I grow up…

Do you remember when you were at school and the teachers used to ask you what you wanted to do “when you grow up”? At Primary school, you were likely to have an ideal of what you wanted to be…but it probably wasn’t until you got to Secondary school that you actually started to think about it seriously. I went through phases when I was at Secondary school…but in the last few years I really wanted to be a ToD (Teacher of the Deaf). However, due to bad experiences in the last year of school with the ToD who supported me, well, she put me off wanting to be one myself. I went off the whole idea of working in schools, of how formal it is…and how, unless you’re one of those teachers that everyone loves, it would make you into a serious kind of person…and I didn’t think that would be “me”.

However, since I do actually want to work with deaf children, one way or another, I’ve changed my mind. On Friday, I had a meeting at a Primary school that has a HIU (Hearing Impaired Unit), about the possibility of me working there for a day or two every week (voluntary). Luckily, it all went well and I start tomorrow (eeeek!). However, when I was there, the lady I met with suggested that I train to become a teacher after I graduate…not through the PGCE (Post Graduate Certificate in Education) scheme but instead through the GTP (Graduate Teaching Programme)… With the PGCE route, you’d mainly be learning via University, with placements at random schools – at the discretion of the University – but with the GTP route, you’d be training on site at the school. The way it works is: it’s one year long, in the first term you’ll teach a class for 20% of the time, in the second term you’ll teach for 50% of the time and in the third term you’ll teach for 80% of the time…and at the end of it, you’ll be a qualified teacher. Obviously, you have to be a graduate, but it means that you can train to be a teacher through hands-on experience in the classroom.

I worked out the other day, that because I’m studying part time, after I’ve finished this year (in June), I’ll still have another 3 years to go until I graduate with a degree…! Normally, if you’re studying full-time, you have to get 120 credits each year for three years to make up a 360 credits Bachelors Degree – I already have the 120 credits for the one year I did last year…so hopefully I’ll be able to transfer them… The course I’m doing with the Open University is only 60 credits per year because I’m doing it part time.

Sometimes, when I look to the future, I kind of wish I was graduating next year…which would’ve happened if I had continued studying full-time…but then I think about it and the fact that I’m studying part-time has opened up more doors for me and allowed me to be free, in a way. I can now do all the things I couldn’t do whilst studying full-time…I can now take photographs to my heart’s content, I can read as many books as I like, I can do random craft projects here and there…I actually have time to blog! I guess, the course I was doing before was just too demanding, both physically and academically. During the day, we were expected to do practical work (drama…) and in the evenings, rather than relaxing, we had log-books to write, essays to do…it just didn’t seem to end. I had looked forward to joining the photography society but didn’t have the time for it…in a lot of ways, the University experience was more of a let-down than the best time of my life – if it was the best time of my life, I would’ve stayed!

So whilst I had originally rejected the idea of becoming a ToD…I am now rather looking forward to it! After doing the GTP, I’d have to do a year or two of ToD training to become a qualified Teacher of the Deaf…I’d much rather be helping deaf children to reach their potential than teaching a class full of children! I just feel that my own experiences as a deaf person will help me to relate to the deaf children’s experiences, I’ll be able to support them with the knowledge of what it’s really like…and I will NEVER, ever, stereotype a deaf child…each deaf child is an individual, with their own needs; one of the worst things is when someone casts you off into the crowd and doesn’t look at your own specific needs. This is what happened when I started A-Levels…I needed support in class, in the form of a note-taker, but the ToD who run the HIU told me: “You’re old enough now, you need to be more responsible…you can take your own notes in class.” I really don’t see how that would’ve been possible, since I can’t lipread and take notes at the same time. Honestly, some people aren’t worthy of the titles they are given!

I just feel that if I were to become a ToD…I could make a real difference. It’s not about me, it’s about changing the life of others. I want to make sure everyone has the chance to shine. I want to make the world a better place for the future generations of deaf children so that they don’t have to go through all the struggles that deaf adults of today have had to go through. It’s been changing, in baby-steps…and we need to keep that change going. I want to be a contributor to that change, I guess.