Welcome first-year students of the FdA Education and Learning 2017-18

This Sway presentation and the words below were used to convey a welcome message to the new students of the higher education course that I teach. 

I hope that you enjoy reading the message.

I am delighted to be able to welcome you to the Foundation Degree in Education and Learning.

First, I want to emphasise how important each and everyone of you is, as a student on this course.  So, to illustrate this, I will use each of the letters of the word FIRST. 

Let's start with 'F'.

When I was driving to work the other day, I heard James Dyson being interviewed on the radio.  The interview focus was on his newly-founded Institute of Technology and Engineering.  One of the questions asked by a listener was about how, when as a struggling inventor, he was able to deal with things when they went wrong, such as when an invention wasn't working out.  In his response, Dyson explained how important failure was. 

Whilst I am aware that I am starting with failure, something that has been largely perceived as a negative experience, according to Dyson such shouldn't be the case.  He explained that he really embraced failure and felt that nothing is inherently learnt from being successful all the time.  He stated that failure is really exciting because although something has gone wrong and you may have had a real miserable experience, you learn from it.  He went on to say it is important that in schools, that we don't write someone off or criticise students when they've experienced failure because they've learnt something.  We all learn from experience and failure is naturally part of that. 

This is a really important message.  To summarise, we should not only embrace our mistakes, but learn from them.  You will each make mistakes whilst on this course and you should know that is okay, because they will help you to learn and to grow.

That takes me to the next letter ‘R’.

The Rose of Jericho or Anastatica is an amazing plant.  It is found in the Middle East and the Sahara.  After the rainy season, the plant dries up, dropping leaves and curling branches into a tight ball, and 'hibernates'.  The ball protects the fruits and seeds.  When wet again in a later rainy season, the ball uncurls and the plant wakes up from its dormant state, which causes the capsular fruits to open to disperse the seeds.  If water is sufficient, the dispersed seeds germinate within hours.  In this way this plant survives the harshness of its environment. 

You will each need to be like the Rose of Jericho, and be resilient, in order to bounce back from issues or difficulties that you may face.  We, as your personal tutors and lecturers, will of course help you to do this on your course.  Talk to us if you are experiencing any issues academically, professionally and personally - we do realise that one area of your life may have the potential to impact upon the others.

The next letter is ‘S’.  It is our very fervent wish for each of you to succeed.  But as part of being successful, you need to be committed to both your course and your work placement, to make the effort to study, to do research on the topics you are learning and also, to enjoy the course.  The latter is so important and helps to develop the intrinsic motivation that you will need to be resilient, but to learn.

The next letter, ‘T’ represents time.  This famous painting ‘Persistence of Memory’, was painted by Salvador Dali in 1931.  It depicts clocks losing their power in a dream world.  In showing you this painting, I want to emphasise that effective time management is another important factor for your success.  Time management allows you to take control of your life rather than follow the flow of others.  When you are effective at it, you accomplish more, you make better decisions, and you work more efficiently.  This leads to a more successful life overall.  It follows that effective time management is also linked to the enjoyment of your course as it helps to prevent being stressed as you are able to work to deadlines whilst also meeting the varied demands of your personal and professional life.

Lastly we have the letter ‘I’.  These many images of the letter ‘I’ symbolise our respect for the unique learner that each of you are.  As part of the transformative learning on this course, we support you each of you to become independent learners.  As an independent learner, it is important that you have self-belief – this is represented by the ‘I’ in the middle of the word believe.  When you have self-belief, you can achieve, and you will succeed.

So, these are all the meanings behind each of the letters in the word FIRST.  Please remember what they mean and take ownership of them throughout the course.

Thank you and again, welcome.