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Intereasting Times: a 1st Year Maths GYG

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Reply 20

Muttley79

Only just found this :smile:

With you all the way - mathematicians rule :biggrin:

Reply 21

Interea

To do list 2:

Soooo things didn't get better in the morning :colondollar:

But it's now a few days later (and I can't wallow in self-pity any longer!), so I'm off to a shared study space by myself for the first time. I haven't yet decided where to go, but the uni has a few good study spaces, so I think I'll just pick whichever the website says is quietest when I go. Here is the plan for today, with my priorities in red:

- Catch up on MA132 videos (about 6 hours at this point :afraid:

) and work through the notes for the extra details
- Plan my tutoring session for tomorrow morning (this will take hours since it's a new further maths module for me)
- Catch up on MA133 videos and review notes
- Catch up on MA136 videos and fill in gaps in my notes
- Do MA131 workbook (it's only 17 questions this week!... :rolleyes:

)
- Start to catch up on LL255
- Email my French tutor for help with the exchange
- Look through the course rep Moodle and work out how to gather responses for our next meeting

It's a long list, but I can head over at about 11:30, and then aside from mentoring for an hour I've got the rest of the day and evening. I usually go to archery on Fridays, but I ended up getting overwhelmed and completely panicking at archery yesterday so I'm too nervous to go back today - it's not exactly a sport you can do without fully focusing for safety's sake! A bit annoying, but at least it gives me more time to study, I definitely need it :lol:

Hopefully I'll have a more positive update next time if I can make the to do list a bit less overwhelming :biggrin:

I hope everyone else is doing well this far into term!

Reply 22

Interea

Update 7: It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

The pressure is finally starting to ease a little! You can definitely tell we're on the final stretch to the holidays, and trust me we all need it :yes:

The study day from my last update/to do list definitely helped, but I'm still massively behind in most modules, so I guess I have a busy Christmas ahead... I don't really mind though, I work a lot better when I don't have constant deadlines as it gives me the flexibility to look after myself, which definitely helps productivity.

The most exciting update this week is that we had a decent amount of snow :snow:

I absolutely love snow, so I very much enjoyed being able to go for a snowy walk, and I think the geese liked it too :biggrin:

(I'll try and upload some photos, but I don't really know how to do that on here, so apologies if it doesn't work)

Spoiler

We still have a lot of work to do in this last week and a half, but the way we're graded means I can work out what to prioritise and what to not care too much about, which is why the pressure has eased a bit. In all modules our work this term is graded as "best (n-1) of n", and we only have 1 credit-bearing assignment left for each module, so we can essentially work out a minimum potential grade for the term. I'm very pleased with how it's gone, my only goal was to survive the term without needing to drop out again so good grades are just a bonus :colondollar:

Differential equations: (Best 4 of 5 assignments count for 15%) 99.5%, so 14.93%
Foundations: (Best 3 of 4 tests count for 15%) 92%, so 13.8%
Analysis I: (Best 7 of 8 workbooks count for 7.5%) 96.9%, so 7.26%
Intro to abstract algebra: (Best 3 of 4 assignments count for 15%) 92%, so 13.8%

It's definitely reassuring to have a nice percentage for each module in the bag to boost my exam grades! I don't know if I'll boost any of these grades with my last assignments/tests since I'm exhausted, but I certainly would not complain with these current grades :biggrin:

In terms of extracurricular stuff, I can't do archery at the minute since my kit keeps breaking a little bit every week, but we have the Christmas meal tonight so I still get to see everyone, and I've got a nice tacky jumper (your standard light up reindeer affair) for the occasion :xmasgrin:

Hope everyone is having a good last few weeks!

Reply 23

Interea

Update 8: Time for a break at last

Well, I officially finished a full term at university! :woo:

I'm actually very proud of myself, when I started really struggling in around week 7 I didn't think I'd manage it, but here we are :h:

Grades:
I did pretty well in my final assignments/tests, especially considering I did most of them the morning they were due because I'd kind of given up. I got 2 23s and 2 25s, leaving me with:

Spoiler

I had a French exam on Saturday too which wasn't my best, but I'm not bothered about that module anyway so it is what it is - it was an interesting topic to consider, and I'm only doing the module for fun, so it worked out pretty well.

Revision:
I don't really have a plan yet, but I have 2 exams on January 10th so I'd better get my act together soon :colondollar:

To be fair I do still have plenty of time, I'm rounding off my organisation for the term today (packing, organising my devices, sorting my budget etc.) so hopefully the revision will start tomorrow. I'll post my plan once I make one! I don't have plans to leave my room before going home on Friday (other than to exercise) since there are a lot of people testing positive around uni at the minute and I'm seeing my gran this weekend... Silver linings though, I guess it means I can really buckle down and focus! :cyber:

Goal review:
I thought now would be a good time to look back at my goals and check how I'm doing.

- Pass the year This one is definitely going better than expected!
- Keep on top of work, instead of reverting to my old habits of procrastination Not sure if I've managed this or not? I'm doing lots of stuff last minute, but I am working all the time and doing things as soon as I get chance to, so I don't think I could realistically call it procrastinating...
- Get back into archery, and just generally improve my fitness Both have faltered a little the last few weeks, but I'm doing a lot more than I did over lockdown and in the years before that, even if it isn't a lot by most people's standards.
- Get involved in societies! Well I joined a lot :lol:

I've not had time to do much, but I have done enough to actually have friends so I'm happy enough. I'm also keeping up my tutoring, volunteering as a mentor, I'm a course rep and I found out this morning that I got a maths ambassador job, which are all things I'd rather spend my time on than random society socials, so I'll accept the defeat here :biggrin:

- Make some real progress in French and Japanese Japanese has been completely lost this term :frown:

I might revive it over Christmas, but then I'd lose it all again next term, so maybe that's a summer project? I can't tell if I'm making progress in French, but I'm using it a lot more which is good.
- Not starve Technically yes, but I definitely need to improve my diet :redface:

I've been eating a balanced and healthy diet, but it's so random and more snacks than meals... Goal for next term is to actually use the oven or microwave at least once!

That's all for now, have a good day everyone :smile:

(edited 2 years ago)

Reply 24

Interea

Just a quick update (for my own future reference more than anything), but I'm going to stop updating this for at least the first half of this term.

It's lovely to have a record of what I've been up to, but my memory is getting so bad that desperately trying to remember what I've done to update this just upsets me now :redface:

Not to mention that with the amount I have to check calendars/diaries/Moodle etc. just to find out what I did yesterday, it feels like writing a school report for someone else, so it doesn't really benefit my personal motivation at all! I hope to come back in a month or 2 with a more positive approach to this GYG :yep:

Reply 25

Interea

Update 9: Term 2 is going so fast!

Things are ticking along fine, I guess :smile:

I'm still having a lot of memory issues, but I've been referred to neurology to try and work it out so it's just a case of getting through those giant waiting lists now. It's not really getting any easier to cope with, but I'm at least learning to work around it for academic work! I think I'll be contacting wellbeing support if I don't hear back with an appointment date soon though, just to make sure things stay manageable - I've learnt from my mistakes at my old uni :redface:

So far this term I've had provisional marks back for the French exam I did before Christmas and the two maths exams I did at the start of term. It definitely took me a while to believe they'd actually sent me the right results, since I was genuinely worried I wouldn't pass one of them :lol:

Scaling has been applied to the maths ones so that's definitely dragging my marks up, but I'm still very impressed with myself considering everything going on! I got:

Spoiler

I'm very glad to have foundations over and done with now, it's nice to have 12 CATS in the bag already (the exam counted for 85%, so with the 15% I already had from class tests I'm over the moon with the result). French and analysis didn't count for that much, but it's still good to have some solid marks banked going into the rest of this term and the summer exams.

Modules this term:
I'm very very very very very busy at the minute, but I'm enjoying the content in a lot of my modules which makes it bearable. Even the modules I expected to not like have turned out to be okay due to good lecturers! I did drop one of the programming modules to try and reduce my screen time since it's definitely not good for me, but the rest are sticking around for now (I can technically drop one more 12 CAT module if needs be though).

French has got a lot more intense this term, with lots more socialising and presentation work, but it's been good practice for the maths ambassador job I've got coming up so I'm quite grateful. Plus we're in the shiny new building, which is very nice (although I don't love how many stairs I have to climb, I'm not the fittest person :colondollar:

). The topics have all been a bit boring for me, but it's a good challenge to pick up some new vocab regardless.

I have 3 stats modules this term, 1 of which has just finished and 2 of which are just beginning. There's a lot of pre-recorded content for these which isn't ideal for the headaches and eye strain, but the content is interesting and a good bit of variety from the maths. It's also pretty easy for me, since much of it is in further maths statistics, and I've spent the last year self-teaching that to tutor it.

The core maths modules are all pretty standard this term. One of them is fully in person, which is sooooo much better for time management and staying engaged - it's the only module I've not fallen behind on so far, since it's the only one that doesn't require pushing through the headaches for 8+ hours of daily screen time :cyber:

I didn't think online learning was that different to in person, but I've definitely seen how hard it's actually been in comparison now! One of our other core modules is a python module, which is fun (and going surprisingly well so far with the marks I've had back :biggrin:

). I was worried it would be too steep of a learning curve, but the module is really well designed so it's hard to get too stuck!

Other stuff:
This term took me a while to settle into, which led to me not socialising for the first 4 or so weeks and being a bit miserable. I'm getting back into the routine now, although it is coming at the cost of sleep since I'm already doing the bare minimum work... I know that I need to prioritise though, and I can afford to let my assignment marks drop a bit if needed, so I'm doing better now. There's a bit of COVID going around my friends so I've been hiding out in my room more than usual this week, but hopefully everyone will be fine by the end of next week and the socialising will recommence :smile: