DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : TMA06 Marked and Returned

Got the results of TMA06 through the post this morning.

The good news is that my tutor appears to have no difficulty reading my hand writing..... well they didn't exactly say that, but the lack of comments saying how poor my hard writing was has lead me to this conclusion.

The other relatively good news is that considering that this is a pretty good test of an essay under exam conditions I was pretty pleased with my mark. Not good enough for a Pass1, and when taken with the the poor result from the last TMA this has left my overall OCAS score tantalizingly close to a Pass1, but not a Pass1.

Tutors comments were both encouraging and helpful, although ideally I think I would like some clarification or advice on specifics, but seeing as this Theme will not come up again maybe that is a waste of precious time.

 So, I guess its time to knuckle down and get the revision started in earnest.

DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : TMA06 problems......

Received an email from my tutor to say he has not received my TMA, which was posted on the 3rd May.

He says he has however received notification from the post office that there is an item waiting for him which does not have enough postage on it, but he hasn't had time to collect it (he seems to have some difficulty getting to the post office which is why we were asked not to send the TMAs recorded delivery, as he would not be in when they came round and he would then have to go to the post office to collect them which was a problem), so  I'm sort of hoping this is my TMA otherwise it really is lost in the post.

Apparently this (under payment) is not uncommon as people misjudge the weight and thickness of the TMAs, and as they are more than a normal 1st or even large packet 1st class stamp there are quite a few across the country waiting for the tutors to make good on the under payment when they collect them. As I 'relied' upon others to post this for me, this could well be my TMA cluttering up the post office.

On the plus side, when I had not received confirmation of the TMA being received by the 8th May, I emailed the scanned copy of the TMA as a backup. However, as this does not have the OU form with it he was giving the post a bit more time and will wait to see what is at the post office before reverting the to electronic version.

On the downside, it looks really unlikely that  I will have a mark or comments when the day school comes around which is a bit unfortunate.

So the moral of this story is don't rely on others for anything important and regardless of what the tutor wants send it recorded delivery.

DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : TMA06 - Done !

I was going to give the TMA a trial run tonight, but I thought 'what's the point', and decided to go for it.

As a practice for the exam it was really useful, the time just flies past, and I'm going to have to re-think my essay plan. In just over 50 minutes, I wrote about 1000 words, and could only fit in two case study examples - which I guess is why they say a minimum of two case studies / arguments.


100 - 120 words - into.

150 - 180 words - definition

210 - 255 words - argument  A

210 - 255 words - argument B

120 - 145 words - conclusion

1000 Words in total

So, get it in the post tomorrow, and I can put my feet up for a week :-)

DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : TMA06 - nearly ready......

I've been making notes for the TMA essay, but looking at them and taking into account that I am pretty sure that 1200 words will be an absolute maximum for the hand written essay, ther eis going to be far less in the essay answer than I would have liked.

The theme lecture videos are at least useful, and the lecture on Centre-Periphery ends with the advice than any answer has to consider these 4 points.

• In what ways, and to what extent is the contemporary state to be regarded as the centre of power?
• Do centres always dominate peripheries?
• Is political power becoming more centralized or more diffuse?
• How should centre–periphery relationships, both territorially and functionally, be organized and adjudicated?

 So, I think I'll give it a go tomorrow to get an idea what can actually be done in about 45 minutes and then go for it for real on Thursday. Get it over and done with before the weekend, have the weekend off and then start studying again..........

DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : Handwriting Speed, therefore length of exam answers.

My tutor advised that we have a go at handwriting a section of text to get an idea of how much we can write in the exam, giving that the handwriting has to be legible and you need a bit of time to plan and some thinking time mid-essay.

I managed 120 words in five minutes copying a section of text, it wasn't as legible as it could have been, but it wasn't too bad.

So if I work on 10 minutes to read the question and set out the essay plan and ideas, 5 minutes during writing as thinking time and 5 minutes at the end to read and if necessary edit/add, that leaves me about 40 minutes of writing, which is effectively 1000 words.

100 - 120 words - into.

150 - 180 words - definition

210 - 255 words - argument  A

210 - 255 words - argument B

210 - 255 words - argument  C

120 - 145 words - conclusion

1000 - 1210 Words in total.

So, this week and over the weekend I'll get the materials needed for TMA06 together, and then the following week I'll see how realistic this schedule really is.

DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : TMA06 & Exam Tutorial

We had a useful tutorial today, with some interesting and lively discussions. However, I'm not sure I'm any happier about the next TMA especially as it has to be hand written.

On the plus side, being limited to an hour to write the TMA means this isn't going to take the amount of time all the others have, especially with the editing and re-writing that usually goes on, which won't be possible with a hand written essay.

I think I have narrowed down the subjects that I will be studying for the exam.

From Section A of the Exam Paper 2 Questions from

Part 1 - What is Politics
Part 2 - Exploring Political Worlds
Part 3 - Politics and Power in the UK
(Not doing Part 4 - Living Political Ideas or Part 5 - Making Policy Shaping Lives)

From Section B of the Exam Paper 1 Question from either,

Theme 1 - Powers & Structures
These 5 - Evidence & Argument


So, first to get the TMA sent off before the 9th May and then study as much as possible for the day school later in the month, then the exam in June..... easy !

DD203 - Power, Dissent, Equality : TMA 6 & Revision

Decided to make an early start on the last TMA and the revision. The most striking thing is that I should have been using these revision videos at the end of each book before writing each of the previous TMAs, I seriously think I missed a trick in not reading ahead and spotting the potential that these video lectures had to concisely summarise each of the chapters and bring out the most useful points.

Oh well..... too late now.

We have a tutorial this weekend and I think the main points I want to get out of that tutorial are revision stratgeies for the exam.

We know there will be 5 questions, 1 from each of the course books in Section A, and 4 Questions from each of the themes (not center-periphery as that is TMA6) in Part B - chose 3 questions at least 1 from each section.

At present I'm thinking about revising 3 of 5 books and 2 themes.

The problem is that I'm not sure which books to revise. Book 1 is nice and short, Book 2 was about comparative politics, Book 3 about the UK politics, Book 4 was theory and ideology and Book 5 was Policy.

Or which themes are Power and Structures, Participation and Descent, Equality and Difference and Evidence and Argument.

Hopefully, it will become clear at the tutorial.