To feel dissapointed with my first essay result which is a few marks from a 1st.

[wastwinsetandpearls]

I missed a 1st in my original degree by a few marks, I was gutted. I want a first this time.

I teach full time and work very long hours during term time. I do not really have time for serious study in the week, so have to fit it into weekends and holidays.

Just before the deadline I had an interview for a promotion ( which I got) so I was not fully focussed.

I am really angry with myself that I have messed up this essay which is the easiest.

Dp on the other hand says I need to be realistic, I am balancing a demanding role at work, a family and a busy life and I should accept that I am probably going to get a 2:1.

I am just a bit sad about it all as well as trying to work out how I am going to fit in more hours of study.

Will my tutor think I am arrogant if I email him and ask what I need to do to get up to a 1st?

Thankyou very much for listening and giving me some advice. DP has gone to bed with a headache so I am going to get in my hour of study before going to sleep.

I couldn't do what you are doing! I feel quite tired just thinking about it.

Cut yourself some slack and make sure you get enough rest too though- the last thing you need is to trigger illness through exhaustion. Good luck

First of all, definitely email and ask for specific advice about where you can improve in future. A very good essay will often have little about this on the feedback form, but your tutor should be able to tell you more. It is certainly not arrogant to ask - I wish more of my students would do this.

Secondly, the first essay being the 'easiest' may also mean it's less easy to really excel on. I have just set a piece of work where everyone is analysing the same text as the first assignment on a course: that starts people off gently but also means it's less likely that anyone will say anything startlingly original and different from anyone else. You may well find that in later assignments you have more opportunities to meet the 'originality' criterion.

But most of all, you have to have faith in yourself and confidence that you can follow an upwards learning curve. Don't lose heart because you missed out this time. You have quite some time yet to improve. A first is often about a sense of the writer's confidence in their own arguments, and in a circular kind of way, if you feel this confidence you can often show it more convincingly. You are obviously capable of the level of work, since you came so close to a first before; you just need to hit your stride - and what helps there is not worrying too much, or, as one of my old tutors once put it, not worrying that you're worrying...

You sound as though you're working very hard. As well as the work you're doing, try to allow yourself time to just quietly reflect on what you've read and the ideas it raises. This is often when you make real strides in learning - though it's also often the hardest thing to make time for amid busy family life. If you have bus or car journeys without anything else to do, it might help to just mull things over, or get a blank piece of paper (carry a notebook around) and make notes about possible connections, ideas and so on, without always feeling you need to be cramming your way through another book (not to diminish the wonderfulness of books and reading there!)

Hope this helps, and the very best of luck to you.

There's a lot of good advice on here but I wanted to say good luck - and to agree that it's harder to really shine at an 'easy' essay. By the way, whatever you get, it doesn't necessarily measure how good you are at the subject, but only how good you were at those particular tests. I am doing postgraduate at the moment and many people who've done best at this level don't have firsts.

Is this the first essay for a new course?

One thing that I have found consistently with the OU is that the mark that I achieve for the first 'easy' essay is lower than those I'm hitting towards the end.

It's very difficult to go into a new course 'cold' and not be 100% sure of what is expected of you, what the material will be like, how much of your existing knowledge will be assumed as 'known' and how much you have to explain in the essay etc.

Don't beat yourself up, a 2:1 is a great mark!

While I do not teach at degree level, when I'm trying to get student up to the next level, I show them work at that level.

It's always real work, from real students. I do not allow them to take it away, of course, but it's the only way for them to see what needs to be done.

I never thought firsts were really that much to do with hard work but simply that on occasion there are one or two brilliant people who just shine out and get them. it's not really something many people can work for although now that so many people get at 2/1 whereas previously only a third did may be there's grade inflation and I'm now wrong.

As someone who got a First for her undergraduate degree... I think you can work for one! I certainly did, and my flatmate at university, who was probably more 2.2 material than 2.1 material, got a 2.1. And we did it because we were hugely strategic in our attitude to marks and examinations. We plotted and planned and put the work in where we would get the greatest payback.

you never cease to amaze me twinset! But you are being waaaaay to hard on yourself - I think that you need to ask yourself why you are doing the degree - is it a means to an end, or are you doing it for your own personal fulfillment - i wouldn't be hung up on the marks. You can ask your tutor what the criteria are that need to be met to obtain a first and see if there is anything that you would have changed.

I always used to have the essay title in mind and also the assesment criteria for that particular module whenever i wrote anything at uni - that always seemed to get me good marks for my essay - i got lots of 1st's for coursework - fisnished 3% away from a first - i was a bit disappointed with the so near but so far thing, but then i thought, no - hang on a minute - 1 person out of our year got a first, i was one of about 15 that got 2;1s this was from 104 students - good enough for me

Don't put too much pressure on yourself, you wont enjoy it.

Also, i dont know if this is relevant to you, but i found that essay marks varied greatly depending on whoever was marking it.

Bonsoir, me and a friend did exactly this plotting and planning for our degree - we would actually sit down with calculators and worked out what % of the degree each peice of work was so we could decide how much work each piece required - not to minimise effort but to make sure the effort went in the right direction. I certainly think it made a whole class mark of difference, my tutor (who was a cow) had predicted me a 2:2, i got a high 2:1 my friend was always brilliant and was pretty much on for a first from the outset, but he was a fecking genius

That's exactly what my flatmate and I did, lucyellesmamma - we had charts all over our kitchen wall by subject and piece of work, and we worked out the minimum %age we needed for each piece of work or exam in order to get our desired degree outcome, and wrote down the actual mark (for coursework) as we received it, and made adjustments elsewhere accordingly.

I didn't realise it at the time (too young) but actually, that is a very good approach to life in general if you want to maximise your own output.

Getting the degree result you want is not an art but a science - even in the humanities!

Twinset, just to reiterate - i think you are amazing!! dont work yourself into the bloody ground woman

Agree about the charts and plotting, worked for me too

For a first you need to be original. You need to have something in your essay that is new or different. I also used to make sure that of all the books I used there were lots not on the reading list, even if I only flicked threw them.

Just wanted to agree with eightieschick, I really think the key to getting a first is finding the time to reflect on what you have been reading and come up with the critical 'original thoughts'. It doesn't require any extra time spent studying beyond that for a 2.1, but it does need extra reflection time. This can be done anywhere - I did a lot of my thinking in the swimming pool, but it could be when washing up/ commuting/ walking / soaking in the bath etc.

good luck with it all it sounds really interesting

PAmela it was the first essay so I think you may be right .

I often carry around a notebook which I use to jot down random ideas for lessons as they come to me. it dri es dp mad as it has made an appearance during meals, the cinema and even walks. I will try to do the same for my studying . hopefully when the weather improves I can spend more time sat in the hills pondering life.

Xenia you may be right. I agree that if you are not 1st
material you will not get one. I do think that you can work in the correct way though and maybe I have not been doing that. I know that sometimes on my teaching the best thing I can do is work a little less and this frees me up to think. I need to apply that to my studying.

For whoever asked about my motivation. It is twofold. When I first started teaching good academic schools wanted theology graduates, which is what I am. This is still true to some extent, but they now want philosophy graduates. I also wanted to update my subject knowledge to improve my teaching . But I also just lo e learning . When I have finished this degree I will do something else.

I asked a woman who always got firsts on assignments how she did it. She said that should would read an article and then read in depth one of the articles referred to in the footnotes.

I took this on board, but would read an article that was contrary to the general consensus, and debate it.

Ilove that is something I have done in the past, thanks for reminding me. There is so much good advice here.

I was curious about what mark a 1st was in the OU (having done some courses in the past) and came across this discussion here

Also, ime, the OU are not keen on you using course books outside the material provided. Which is also mentioned on that thread. They don't seem to like disagreement with their material either, I felt.

Must admit, I hate all this idea of reducing study to "working in the correct way" to get the desired mark. I know it's teh way of teh world etc but I hate - like knowing the "rules" for job applications etc. Everything is reduced to a formula.

said - I don't agree that working within guidelines and objectives is the same as working to a formula. Having to meet quite precise targets is in fact an excellent discipline for the display of creativity - pushing the boundaries as far as they can reasonably go helps you to organise your thoughts.

Agree with the formula thing to some extent. I gave my Yr 10 a task this week and they all said, 'How will we be marked?' and 'What is the assessment criteria?' and I felt a bit guilty when I told them that actually, it might help them understand the text but that we were mostly doing it for fun!

Education is being reduced to numbers, sadly - and once that happens, it is easy to say that we must raise the percentage achieving mark X, year on year etc - until you end up with the situation that suggests 'failure' if you don't achieve a first - or whatever.