It is … *counts fingers and toes* … eleven years since I graduated from uni with my PGCE. Nope, twelve years.
(yes, i teach some maths, sigh)
I spent five years at university - the first year I did a BEd in primary teaching, but gave that up because I realised I didn’t actually want to teach ickle nippers. I spent the next three years working towards a BA (Hons) in Religious Studies and Sociology (with a smattering of English Literature thrown in for good measure) and finished it all off with a post graduate teaching qualification.
And then I entered the Big Bad World of Being an Adult and Holding Down a Job.
I loved being a student. Those few years were, without doubt, the best years of my life (until I met The Blokey, naturally*).
I have no idea how I managed to get a 2.1 (Hons) degree. I drank copious amounts of alcohol, indulged in many (disasterous) love affairs and flirtations, spent many moonlit hours talking, frolicking in parks, laughing on beaches, or walking on hills, and barely listened in lectures because I was always too busy daydreaming.
Back then we didn’t have a plethora of knowledge at our fingertips by virtue of the World Wide Web (although I did recieve my very first email address during my last year there, but I never used it because I didn’t know how) and it was more than acceptable to give in hand-written essays. No ordinary person had a mobile phone (I had only ever seen one, and that was on Only Fools and Horses) and we didn’t need jobs to see us through uni because we didn’t mind living in squalor and eating beans and instant noodles everyday.
I miss that life I had. It was very carefree, very laidback and amazingly good fun. But I couldn’t ever live that life again. I can, however, give in to my inner student and indulge her thirst for knowledge and learning. Which is why I signed up for another course with the Open University.
I considered a Masters, but finances – although not limited – are not really available for that. Not to mention my head. I really don’t think my head could cope with a Masters after this many years away from the World of Study. So, I’ve signed up for a module called An Introduction to the Social Sciences. It’s worth thirty credits and Tesco have paid for it (thank you Tesco!) … I’m looking at it as an Introduction to Studying Again, with a view to doing the second part of the course which begins in October, as this first part finishes.
This gives me a year to consider my options. Option one would be that it’s a bit of fun, but studying really isn’t for me now and I should try my hand at something else instead. I’m hoping I don’t need to really consider that option. Option two (which is the most likely) is that I’ll end up studying for a second degree, probably either in Psychology or Criminology. Option three will be the Masters.
But for now I’m just going to enjoy this contemporary student lark. I can do my research on the Internet, listen to lecturers on my iPod whilst sitting on the bus, type up (gasp) my essays and not turn up for tutorials without being penalised for not doing so.
It’s like another world!
I have discovered that my love of lolling around on the bed with books spread out around me, and highlighters tangled up in my hair, is a preferred learning method which hasn’t quite buggered off. It will make it impossible to type up essays though (what with the fact that I don’t own a laptop) …
(* just in case he’s pulled up a chair and started reading)