[DJTom]

(Original post by Kate.)
I spend a lot of time cooking in general, we never have freezer food or ready meals, pretty much everything I eat is made from scratch. Most weekends I'll make some muffins or cookies and I'll make a couple of different things for birthdays & other special events.

I wish there was a baking OU course. Haha.

wow your good i wished my mum did that. yeah there should be.

[Kerr Avon]

(Original post by GreatUnderachiever)
Be prepared for no social life with the open university!!!

OK I don't care if you posted ages ago, you sir are an idiot of the highest order!

[GreatUnderachiever]

(Original post by Kerr Avon)
OK I don't care if you posted ages ago, you sir are an idiot of the highest order!

oh believe me, i speak from experiance.

[GreatUnderachiever]

(Original post by Kate.)

I wish there was a baking OU course. Haha.

you cant really do baking with the OU, as it needs a lot of face to face work and the equipment and ingridents etc it could be a lot mroe expensive then arts courses etc

same with painting etc, they don't really teach you how to "paint" at the open university, only the history of art...

but there is the OCA (open arts college) if you want to learn a painting degree, check it out (photography also).

[jimfrederikson]

(Original post by DJTom)
i havent meet any open uni students yet but i plan to but i havent been going out as much as i used but the main thing is im gretting courses done etc

Ha I guess you're not studying English?

[Persipan]

(Original post by GreatUnderachiever)
same with painting etc, they don't really teach you how to "paint" at the open university, only the history of art...

They do offer a certain amount of design - they seem to be going in for it more now the technology to submit work without having to post it to them is available...

Edited to add: just been looking at the OCA stuff, and it looks ace. May be about to do something silly...

[Bleak Lemming]

Wow I've never heard of the OCA and before I started with the OU I always wanted to do some sort of distance learning arts course. Seriously think I might sign up for the 'Start Drawing' module and take it from there! Surely it can't be that much hard work, 8 hours / week Fancy doing it just for enjoyment more than anything. Haven't done art since A-level when I was put off by a horrible teacher ugh.

Has anybody done the start drawing or start paining modules?

(Original post by Persipan)
May be about to do something silly...

me too! I also read that they don't have 'set dates' for starting modules. You can get your materials within a few days of paying.

It would be nice if you could crack on through the materials as fast as you liked. I'd have one of the modules done within a few months :P

[Persipan]

(Original post by Bleak Lemming)
me too! I also read that they don't have 'set dates' for starting modules. You can get your materials within a few days of paying.

And it's cheaper if you start now - though their 2012 fee rises aren't anything like so horrendous as the OU's...

I'm actually signed up to start T189 (the photography module) with the OU in May - doubling it up with the 60-pointer I'm doing at the moment, which'd leave me needing 10 credits of Level 1, again having to be doubled up at some point next year. There are a few downsides to this, though; it could get a bit busy at certain points, and I'm not mad keen on the idea that for T189 you don't actually have a tutor and just sort of fend for yourself. What I'm wondering now is whether I could cancel T189 and instead do an OCA Level 1 photography 40-pointer, which I could start more or less straight away and do at whatever pace I felt like, and then transfer the credit across to the OU to finish off Level 1.

There's also a Level 2 OCA Writing for Children module I'd really like to do. I've wanted to do a module in that for ages, but the OU don't do one that's so specific. (I was thinking of doing the Level 3 OU Children's Literature module as the next best thing, when I get to that point, but I prefer studying the process to studying the end result and the reviews of it are rather offputting, so I'd more or less talked myself out of that already.) But, in order to do OCA Level 2 stuff as credit-bearing, I'd need to have Level 1 out of the way there, too. Which I could theoretically do by transferring credit in the other direction, using the 40 credits of Creative Writing I've already got and something from the degree I've already got to exempt me from the rest of their Level 1... Which leaves me more or less teetering on the brink of signing up for a second distance learning degree at the same time as the one I'm already doing. Oops...

[Bleak Lemming]

(Original post by Persipan)
And it's cheaper if you start now - though their 2012 fee rises aren't anything like so horrendous as the OU's...

I'm actually signed up to start T189 (the photography module) with the OU in May - doubling it up with the 60-pointer I'm doing at the moment, which'd leave me needing 10 credits of Level 1, again having to be doubled up at some point next year. There are a few downsides to this, though; it could get a bit busy at certain points, and I'm not mad keen on the idea that for T189 you don't actually have a tutor and just sort of fend for yourself. What I'm wondering now is whether I could cancel T189 and instead do an OCA Level 1 photography 40-pointer, which I could start more or less straight away and do at whatever pace I felt like, and then transfer the credit across to the OU to finish off Level 1.

There's also a Level 2 OCA Writing for Children module I'd really like to do. I've wanted to do a module in that for ages, but the OU don't do one that's so specific. (I was thinking of doing the Level 3 OU Children's Literature module as the next best thing, when I get to that point, but I prefer studying the process to studying the end result and the reviews of it are rather offputting, so I'd more or less talked myself out of that already.) But, in order to do OCA Level 2 stuff as credit-bearing, I'd need to have Level 1 out of the way there, too. Which I could theoretically do by transferring credit in the other direction, using the 40 credits of Creative Writing I've already got and something from the degree I've already got to exempt me from the rest of their Level 1... Which leaves me more or less teetering on the brink of signing up for a second distance learning degree at the same time as the one I'm already doing. Oops...

Haha, I'll probably end up doing it as I read that the workload isn't too much (at least for the photography one, which I won't be doing).

My brain isn't working at the moment so I won't be enrolling today! Post night shift brain fog :l no idea what i'm doing!

Do you think that the OU would accept the OCA modules at credits? I suppose they are accredited by a brick uni, think I read new westminster university. I wouldn't be using them myself!

Also I read that when you register you can either register as 'personal development' or as 'undergraduate', if you select personal development you don't get your assignments / pieces / art marked which seems pointless! so make sure you pick the right one!!

[Persipan]

(Original post by Bleak Lemming)
Do you think that the OU would accept the OCA modules at credits? I suppose they are accredited by a brick uni, think I read new westminster university. I wouldn't be using them myself!

No reason why they wouldn't; it's all CATS points and I'm doing the Open Degree so they don't really care what you've done credits in, so long as you've done 'em. It's Bucks New that accredits them, but I can't be too rude about that 'cos I used to work for them!

[GreatUnderachiever]

(Original post by Bleak Lemming)
Wow I've never heard of the OCA and before

Glad to help!

[Spinnerette]

Idk what you mean lol. a lot of us have families, husbands/wives etc my social life is the same as it's always been.

[anniemc]

Haha, I didn't have one before OU, why should I start now?