Home Learning Courses

[ozwald]

Afternoon and a Happy New Year to you all!

 

I'm looking at taking a home learning course this year in Mechanical Engineering, mainly for personal interest but if I enjoy it maybe taking it further to a change of career. I've found this course from ICS,

 

http://www.icslearn.co.uk/distance-learning-courses/btec-level-3-advanced-certificate-in-mechanical-engineering.aspx

 

I will be dropping them an e-mail to discuss further, but I thought I'd throw this up on here to see if anyone has done the home learning thing themselves and if they had any advice to offer, or alternative course suggestions.

 

Thanks for reading,

[rtbiscuit]

i did attempt an OU course a while back i ended up dropping it near the end, and resitting the year properly at a college. personally it didn't suit my learning style. but for many others it worked well.

 

for me it felt very isolated and you are completely reliant on yourself, i felt i lacked support and it can be easy to get lost in all the paper work. but that doesn't mean to say its not a good option.

 

i've never heard of ICS, but if i was to do an external learning qualification i'd be looking at the OU as their reputation is well regarded and they have been doing it a long time. one thing i've learnt in engineering is that its not just the qualification you hold, but where you got it from that counts.

 

my degree in engineering is from coventry, a well regarded engineering uni.

 

the worst thing you want to do is invest alot of hardwork and effort into something that turns out to be worthless when you decide to change profession.

 

make sure the course is accredited by one of the big institutes like IMECH or IENG etc

[coldel]

i did attempt an OU course a while back i ended up dropping it near the end, and resitting the year properly at a college. personally it didn't suit my learning style. but for many others it worked well.

 

for me it felt very isolated and you are completely reliant on yourself, i felt i lacked support and it can be easy to get lost in all the paper work. but that doesn't mean to say its not a good option.

 

i've never heard of ICS, but if i was to do an external learning qualification i'd be looking at the OU as their reputation is well regarded and they have been doing it a long time. one thing i've learnt in engineering is that its not just the qualification you hold, but where you got it from that counts.

 

my degree in engineering is from coventry, a well regarded engineering uni.

 

the worst thing you want to do is invest alot of hardwork and effort into something that turns out to be worthless when you decide to change profession.

 

make sure the course is accredited by one of the big institutes like IMECH or IENG etc

 

Cov Uni Engineering When I was there (in the not so well regarded economics department) I house shared with some final year students for a few weeks who were on the engineering/design course, they all had five or six A* A-Levels each and already had top of the line jobs sorted for when they left at Suzuki etc.

[AK350Z]

I've heard of ICS, but don't discount Adult Education from local colleges and universities. My girlfriend is doing a masters in Geographic Information Systems via Leeds University distance learning dept. There are face to face sessions if you want them, but you never have to go in if you don't want to.

[rtbiscuit]

I've heard of ICS, but don't discount Adult Education from local colleges and universities. My girlfriend is doing a masters in Geographic Information Systems via Leeds University distance learning dept. There are face to face sessions if you want them, but you never have to go in if you don't want to.

 

didn't know uni's did that, sounds like a good idea.

[AK350Z]

I've heard of ICS, but don't discount Adult Education from local colleges and universities. My girlfriend is doing a masters in Geographic Information Systems via Leeds University distance learning dept. There are face to face sessions if you want them, but you never have to go in if you don't want to.

 

didn't know uni's did that, sounds like a good idea.

 

Probably expanding in these cash-strapped times Rich. Obviously they only offer certain courses, but probably worth checking out. The Leeds Uni online distance learning portal is very impressive, and you still get full use of the library by mail and student licence copies of software. Their distance learning setup and support was the main reason Fran decided on them.

[Matt L]

I self study acca through kaplan who offer the following 3 methods of learning.

 

completely self study (you get the text books and thats it)

online lectures (basically tutor other end of a webcam and works through stuff)

go to college at weekends.

 

I have done all 3 methods over the past few years.

 

Self Study:

by far and away the hardest for me as i lack self motivation towards doing it as i have never yet left education so its starting to annoy me (still got many years ahead as well).

it is good as obviously you go at your own pace so you can do things quicker/slower as you see fit, but if your anything like me then it all gets left to be one mad rush at the end, it also means you put all your trust in a text book which from my experience is utterly rubbish the amount of mistakes i find in them is untrue and they also occasionally do not explain answers so your still non the wiser at the end of a chapter (obviously this is not neccasarily the case for all text books).

it also means that if you dont quite follow something or you learn something in the wrong manner then come exam time your goosed.

 

online lectures:

this was very good and very bad at the same time, good as you have someone to guide you through and to show you quicker/easier ways to work things out compared to the long handed ways in text books, obviously got someone to explain stuff you dont get. Ours were also recorded which meant that you could go back and rewatch an entire lecture when ever you wanted.

 

the bad points is... your on the internet watching a lecture so all it takes is a quick click onto another site and then your surfing the net whilst listening to the lecturer and not learning anything, it was also prone to a few hickups like lines dropping and sound not being very clear etc.

 

college/uni:

suppose this all depends on who the teacher is/class mates are as if you get one class mate that really doesnt get something then the lecturer will go over it loads until they get it which means your left twiddling your thumbs and staring off out the window until you move on to something new and if the whole class is disruptivethen your not going to get much work done and its all left to do at home. Does however mean you have more people you can talk to, to help you with work if you need it/explain things in ways you may understand over a lecturer for example.

 

general adviceadvice would be its very time consuming, for example i get up at 6.30 everyday, leave house for 7, work all day at a computer screen, get back in at 6 at the earliest so by the time you have had a rest/food/sorted anything else out its nearly 8 and the last thing your going to want to do is pick up a book or watch a lecture, so you need to be very strict/dedicated to do it alongside work imo.

 

I know people it works very well for ie they will take 3/4 exams at a time as they have the self control to literally lock themselves away every night for a few hours with no forms of communication to allow them to work.

 

where as i cant do that and prefer to keep some form of social life so i only do 2 or 1 at a time.

 

I know parts of this wont relate to your exact question but i just thought id share my experience.

[Ricey]

You've definitely got to be a certain type of person for home learning.

 

It can be VERY hard to motivate yourself and like Rich said your very isolated even if you have 'access' to a designated tutor.

[ozwald]

Thanks for all the advice guys, I've got no problems on the motivation front, it's something I really want to do and I've already got my designated study area set up, plus I've always found it easier to learn when left to my own devices.

 

Unfortunately some options aren't available to me, we have no Uni's on the Island so that rules out attending part time courses, and our Adult Education centre only offers what I suppose you would consider basic courses, it's a route I've already looked into.

 

I'll check out Uni's offering Distance Learning courses, thanks for that AK350Z, and Matt L I'll check out Kaplan and see what they have to offer.