The FIRST day

I'm writing this blog and will hopefully continue to inform anyone out there, who may read it, what it's actually like. It's also for my own piece of mind so I can look back over the fond memories (hopefully).

I'm going to keep this blog so it is purely about the PGCE, (i'm doing primary by the way) I hope i'm also having a social life at the same time!

I started the course yesterday. I'm in a new city and at a new university so i'm having to learn where everything is all over again. I really wasn't sure what to expect, i'd been given a timetable so I knew we were just having a few introductory lectures, some forced socialising (which I hate) and registration.
The first problem I encountered was where to sit. When I got to the lecture theatre there was already quite a few people there. I chose to wait out on the socialising front and sat on the next row behind. As it turned out people had to move closer as there was a lot more people than I was expecting - 84 students and so I ended up sat next to people. The lectures weren't anything strenuous, they passed around yet more pieces of paper and handbooks (you get a lot of handouts) and just introduced the main concepts of the course. There was a lecture about the trip to the botanic gardens which we went on today and a final one on the primary strategy. The primary strategy is in essence a book telling you what pupils should know in literacy and numeracy (well that's the impression I get at the moment!). We also discussed 'excellence and enjoyment' a concept to remind schools that even though there is a national curriculum it still needs to be varied and interesting for the pupils.
We had short breaks between these lectures and so I got to know a bit about the girl sat next to me. I'd much rather get to know people this way - it's a lot less stressful!!
We then had dinner in one of the other buildings, it was intended to create more socialising but the room wasn't big enough for us all and once you get passed where you went to uni and what you did the conversation kind of runs out unless they're a particularly chatty person. It was only 45 minutes though so a quick getaway was at hand.
We had to go to our colleges (we had to be part of one even though i'm not living there) and pick up our registration forms and campus cards. Luckily I'd managed to upload my photo so unlike a lot of people who had to tramp all the way over to the science site, I had quite a large break in which I went home since I live 5 minutes away.
We have to do a science audit test to show ourselves how much we know (or don't) and so I took this two hours as an opportunity to do it. It wasn't that hard but it was difficult to regurgitate some of the stuff. It was based on GCSE level and even though I have A-levels in all the sciences and a biological sciences degree some of the stuff I hadn't done since I was 15. I got 84% it sounds like a high mark but I have no idea what it's like compared to everyone else. I should have been a high scorer i'm one of only a few students with a science degree there. I don't know if we'll find out either.

All in all the first day wasn't too bad I made a couple of friends (who are meeting me to walk to the botanic gardens tomorrow so I don't get lost!) and it wasn't as full on as I thought it was going to be!