And what skills have I learned today?

Personal Development Plan
Personal Development Plan has helped me with several skills. Time management is probably the greatest skill learned, and the most useful. Planning of time is needed to ensure work is completed on time and to give myself a good work flow. Self Evaluation during weekly Blogs helps me overlook my week and see what went wrong and how I could improve it the next time around.

Tutorials
Tutorials are probably my favourite way of learning. I enjoy looking through tutorials on the internet and following them, but I also implement some of my own work into them. Making small changes to tutorials rather than just copy and paste I feel increases your understanding. I am always determined to complete them first, although this doesn't happen much. I keep trying though.

Lectures
Lectures have greatly improved my listening skills and note taking skills. I can look back at my old notes and notice the difference. My notes are now more in-depth, and more keywords are taken. Being able to take notes as well as listen to the lecturer is harder than it seems although I have improved dramatically. Participating in lectures and asking questions has not been one of my best attributes, although I feel like I am participating more and more as each lecture is given.

Group work and Team Projects
Although this is new to the course, I feel that I am benefitting from it already. I am now more confident, as I have a role that I will enjoy throughout the project. I am also more motivated as I don't want to let my team mates down. Motivation I feel has been one of my biggest downfalls but I am learning to overcome it. As the Project Manager is now dishing out mini deadlines I am now completing tasks earlier and on time rather than at the last minute.

Oral Presentation
Confidence has also been another one of my down points. I do feel more confident in showing my work now and talking it through with everyone. I am more relaxed, although still nervous at times. I look forward to some presentations as it allows me to gain feedback on my work which I enjoy receiving. Knowing what other people think about my work greatly motivates me, and sometimes I feel I try too hard to impress everyone.

Writing Essays
I have learned many writing skills including not to type unnecessary work. I am now able to keep my writing grammatically correct and in an academic format, which I feel benefits me loads. My English skills have also increased, as this was something I didn't manage to do well at school.

Maths and Statistics
I didn't expect there to be any of this during the course. I soon learned I was wrong. Mathematical skills are usually required when having to work from a budget and adding up prices. I feel that these have improved my Maths skills. I have always enjoyed Maths but didn't do too well in this subject at school. Being able to read statistics and store them in pie charts and tables has made me learn that even small percentages of information mean something, and should never be disregarded. This I feel has also helped me with research skills.

Observations
Observing other peoples work I feel sometimes drops my confidence, seeing how great their work is compared to mine. On the other hand it makes me more dedicated to try and be as good as them.

Research
I feel that I have learned research skills, and find more information from sources than any time previously. It has also helped increase my note taking skills.

Exams and Revision
Exams I enjoy, as it gives me a chance to test my knowledge. I feel that working under the pressure of a set time also helps me. I can work well under pressure and by taking these tests further increases my work. Revising for exams I tend to leave until the last minute, but lately I have been going over a lot of my work regularly. I feel that this will help me achieve a pass first time during assignment hand ins.

Down points
1. Lack of motivation towards research
Research has to be my least favourite part of self study. Knowing that this work has to be done is my only motivation. I should learn to enjoy this part as it is a good chance to learn new things. I feel that once I enjoy doing research I will overcome this down point.

2. Leaves small tasks to the very last minute
This is something I am working on now. I will ensure that all the small tasks like designing the CD label and sorting out references will not be left until the last minute. I have also created a check list that enables me to tick off my completed work. I feel that this will enable me to overcome this down point very soon.

3. Confidence in my own work
Sometimes I feel that my work isn't good enough, or that genuine mistakes are easily made in my work. I feel that a better understanding of HTML and CSS will overcome this by part. But I feel that reading the assignment sheet more carefully will help me better understand the work. Hopefully decreasing the chance of me making silly mistakes that get me referred.

4. Time Management???
I feel that a lot of the above comes under this heading. Spreading work out will give me more time for other tasks, and things that are usually left to the last minute I should prepare beforehand.