Reflective learning

'Reflective Learning' has been investigated by many, as clearly it is a key aspect of higher education and the development of a learner. However, it is also important to note that feed back from lecturers is just as vital, yet, it is as important to also reflect on what is being learnt.
There are many skills for reflective learning to become a useful tool, such as an awareness of what is being learnt, strengths and weaknesses of their learning, and a concious attitude towards personal goals and targets. Effective reflective learners have good motivation levels, attitudes and ideas, appropriate distractions and gaps within their learning. Reflective learning does not only take place is an educational environment, but also at home and work.
Reflection is important because reflective learning provides the opportunity to resolve any confusion, develop yourself as an independent learner and to keep track of personal progress. Reflective learning is something fairly easy to achieve, either through a hand written journal or through the use of ICT.
A 'reflective journal' should not be bogged down with description, but instead, reflections on what you have learnt. It is possibly, a good idea to 'reflect' as much as possible, and to include informal aspects of your learning, including feelings about your lecturer/other students, and your ideas of how to learn most effectively. Reflective learning simply provides the opportunity to keep track of your learning and the progress of it, and to add to what you have already learnt. Honesty is key- trust your own methods and approaches to learning. A positive attitude to learning create advanced and more suitable skills.
One such method to 'document' learning is through the use of a blog (such as Blogger.) A blog is useful, as it expands the range of many things, including, communication, learning, education and technology, and so is regarded a potential excellent learning tool for reflective learning. Such a claim, is supported by Kolb (1984) who suggests, that an experience on its own does not create sufficient learning, but techniques such as thinking and discussing solidifies the learning experience almost. Kolb continues, and implies that the acquired learning must be tested in new situations; the learner must make the link between the theory and action.
On the other hand Gibbs (1988) identified a series of 6 steps to aid reflective learning- description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusion and an action plan.

Sian's seminar

Today in Sian's seminar we went over what the Harvard Referencing System is & how to use it.

It seems pretty straight forward really, nothing to worry about. But then I suppose we'll soon see how straight forward it is when I start writing assignments.

Bubbl.us

Uni is costing me so much!!

So we've been in uni for like a month & I've had 2 new tattoos already!! The picture above is the first one &&& The one below is the newest one. I need to stop spending so much money on tattoos!!

This is me + uni friends <3 (- Harley)
Beth.P = This girl is special bless her. She's such a lovely girl & keeps us entertained. She's so easily amused, lover her. Got so much time for her though mind, loves her loads.
Jodie = Well, Jodie is the life and soul of no matter what we're doing. If you're easily offended don't talk to her, honest now. One of her favourite words is peadophilia! One of the nicest girls in the world though.
Bekkiie = Bekkiie is the one I had decided she was going to be my friend before we'd even gotten to uni, whether she liked it or not. Such a nice girl, even though she's English ;)
Ryan = Ryan is the only one in our little "group" who isn't doing Ed' Studies. We've accepted him dispite this. He's a lovely lad, always a good laugh :)
Harley = Harley takes so much stick off us! The banter flies around our group but most of it is aimed at Harley. To be fair to him he gives it all back too! Seemed like such a nice lad, until he came out of his shell. Lads got some issues.

What the actual....

So, we've just been told that for our Problem Solving Assignment, we have to MAKE a toy. Sorry hun but I took Educational Studies, not freaking carpentry like. How am I going to make this crap ?? Stressing me out already!!

Evaluation of our presentation.

For our presentation we chose to do dinosaurs. We decided on this subject at random as we couldn't come up with an interest that we all agreed with. In order to find the website we used, we Google searched the word Dinosaurs. We each picked a website each and looked through them to see which one was the best.  In hindesight we should have looked at more than one website each in order to get the one we used. This would have helped us get a broader view of what was available to us.
  Once we had our website we used site; in order to find out if our site was reputable and reliable. This was a helpful thing to do as the results showed us many links that contatined the same sort of content as the one we had chosen for our presentation. This told us that our site was legitimate and a good one to use. We also used the fact that the web address contained an "ac.uk" as a sign that it was a reliable one to use. This was the case as, "ac" in a web address means that the site is an academic one.
  Next we went through the site, looking at how much information it gave and how helpful this information was. We also took notes about how easy the site was to use and how appealing it was. All this was vital information for our presentation.
  We found that the site's set up was a bit boring and plain. Due to this it would not appeal to a younger audience so we concluded that it was aimed more at an older reader.  The site was also full of text and did not contain many pictures throughout. This also suggested that it was aimed at an older reader as younger audiences would need pictures and many colours in order to keep their attention.
 Our chosen site also didn't go into much detail about the dinosaurs. In order to use it efficiently you would either have to have another site / reference at hand or you would need some prior knowledge of dinosaurs.

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/nature-online/life/dinosaurs-other-extinct-creatures/dino-directory/

Starting up.

So we've been told to start this blog for uni. So here goes.

This is me. I'm Elizabeth Smith, call me Beth. (There's a Beth P too, gets confusing). I'm 19, in my first year of uni. I took a year out last year, cause I'm simply cool like that.

I'm from Swansea so I live at home. Which is about 20 minutes away from uni.

I decided to do Ed' Studies because I want to be a Primary School teacher, although I'm open to other career options which allow me to have more tattoos (I have 6 & they're growing).

I didn't want to move away from home for uni because if I'm 100% honest with you, I'd be crap away from home! Plus I wouldn't have been able to afford it, considering I have a car to run.

You may hear me talking about a little boy called Jack a lot. He's my nephew / Godson, not my actual son. Just to clear that up.

So yeah, that's pretty much me.

p.s. The picture up top is of me!