Well... December is here, advent has started and I am yet to do any Christmas shopping! I am shocked an appalled at myself! I suppose I still have enough time though. It is the end of term in less than two weeks, and though I will probably be given a mountain of work to do, I am hoping to have a small amount of time at the being of the holidays to relax and enjoy seeing everyone back home. I am starting to miss it all quite a lot, even though I swear there is nothing to do, I still wish I was sitting in the Slug (and Lettuce) with my friends, enjoying and overpriced cup of coffee and chatting for hours, because it is just too cold to go outside.
I went home for a weekend the other week. Had a couple of nights of really good sleep in my own bed. I had a really lovely surprise when I got back to Leeds as well. My Mum has packed a parcel in my suitcase, it contained a new homemade advent calendar, which in the last 3 days has yielded wonderful little presents, so THANK YOU MUM! I was worried that wouldn't have an advent calendar here (and buying one for myself just felt a little sad), but I am now very much enjoying advent.
Since handing in all of our first modules work for evaluation work seems to have come in flurries (a little like the snow I wish would fall here "up north"). We were given a research brief for the few days we had off whilst our work was being marked; we had to choose our favourite subject, and produce 40 A4 pages, plus a sketchbook of research about it. I chose skiing as my subject and worked really hard to get all the information that we had been asked to collect - sorting through family photos from the 12 or so years. The day back at uni we had to swap work with someone, this proceeded to happen 3 more times, each time the work we were given would require more research. Eventually we were given our own work back, and are now working on a new brief. The idea of the whole process was to get us all to understand the process of research a bit better. I can safely say that yes, I do understand research better, but I am no fan of giving my work to other people. Surely it isn't a particularly efficient way of motivating students to do work... especially if you get a subject you hate, or have no interest in!
Anyway, we've all been pretty busy which has meant a fair amount of sleep loss, and getting irritated quite easily about all the other work we have to finish for critical studies, and the brief for visual language!! Never mind, it will soon be Christmas and I will have an excuse for being lazy :D
We received our grades back for the module we've completed. Everyone was pretty nervous, as we have to pass the first year to continue onto the second (therefore requiring us to pass every module), even though the grades we do get this year, don't count toward our degree. I passed with 66% (which equates to a 2:1) so I'm really pleased, and know where I need to improve now!
