Resolution Review 03/03

So, it’s here already, my first review of the resolutions I set myself last month.

Since last month, when I announced the resolutions, I’ve released a copy of the Standard Model, designed to work well on projectors, meaning everything can be zoomed into and out of, while it’s still one big spider-diagram, I’ve published a lovely sheet to help me remember what my resolutions are, and how I’m going to achieve them, and I’ve started work on a new design for the blog and an extended article about creating themes for Wordpress.

So, with it being 03/03 today, I met with my resolution partner to review how the first month had gone, the general feeling was that, unlike a lot of people who start resolutions, we hadn’t totally given up within this first month, but, at the same time, we weren’t really able to show any significant improvement, or quantify our achievement at all.

While I’m not falling behind at all, I’m finding that the fun and creative side of my studies is sometimes not taking priority over the more fun tasks of creating revision aids and similar, which I did try to promise myself it would.

Before our next review on 04/04, I’m going to;

Studies

• Completely organise all of my folders, and get them all checked
• Make some substantial progress on, and publish my academic bookmark library

Studious Creativity

• Publish two of my new revision aids, although both will still be in beta
• Following from the reorganisation of my notes, publish my findings regarding how it goes, and the most appropriate and effective way to organise work like that

Pure Creativity

• Re-work my blog design. I started this last month, but never got very far, so I’m going to finish it, and publish it within the next fortnight
• Publish my extended article on creating Wordpress themes, aimed at complete beginners with a bit of HTML and CSS knowledge, like I was once

Fitness

• Have a serious review of my lifestyle, especially my diet and the amount of sleep I get, and put something in  place to fix this
• To fit my fitness activities around my normal activities, I’m going to try going to the pool before school, aiming to be in the changing rooms at around 7AM, when a lot of my peers are in bed

I’m still aiming to do something in each of these categories every week, each is an aspect of the main goals on my cheat sheet.

I’ve got a bit of commercial web design to get done too, not too much, but enough for it to eat into my pure creativity time, so I’ve gone for tasks that I’ve already started, where I can put as much work as I choose into them, without compromising on quality.

The next key revelation, is that this morning, on my resolution review day, I also received my annual report from school. Overall, very positive, and I’ve been able to identify specific points I need to fix. Over the next few days, I’m going to be reviewing the specifics of these, and I’ll follow this up with a summary on the blog.

So, I’m still not going after any numerically-based scheme as I was so tempted, but I’m aiming to complete, all ten big tasks listed here, and four little tasks (one per strand of the goals), per week, hopefully, if this works, by my next review day (04/04 of course!), I’ll be able to quantify my performance pretty well!

WJEC By3 Biology Practical Exam Folding Prompts

Following on from the (exclusively personal) success of my resolution cheatsheet, (although I must admit the mistake of not printing enough, I’ll sort that out over the weekend), I’m starting to get a bit of a thing for these simple, portable designs which are there solely to serve as a reminder of something.

With my AS Biology Practical exam coming up, I’ve been going over some old write-ups from class, what I did well with, and what I failed miserably at. There aren’t any patterns, so I need something short and snappy to remind me.

I’ve looked at lots of mnemonics, but for the shear quantity of information, there’s no way I can momorise it all like little facts. I needed a new idea.

While I was preparing for my Ph1 Physics exam, I created an 8-page booklet out of a single A4 sheet, and wrote out the derivation of a SUVAT equation on each, then, whenever I had a spare few minutes, I could get it out and start flicking through it. I did this a bit late, and couldn’t learn anything, and relied solely on common sense in the exam, but the idea seemed to work pretty well.

So, while I’m trying to learn my By3 points; what gets marks and how to generally succeed, I’ve put together a new one, which lists through the key areas of the By3 mark scheme, and what needs doing for each. While it’s not allowed into the exam, it’s something that needs learning, but in theory, it should be relatively easy to learn in this format.

I’m releasing a PDF version, which is all ready to print onto A4 paper, then fold neatly into a booklet shape, the booklet is small enough to slip into a pocket. It isn’t cheating, and doesn’t break any rules (although it shouldn’t go into the actual exam). This is only the same information as is available from WJEC directly.

Download WJEC By3 Biology Prompts (PDF, 100KB)

I’m rather interested to get any feedback on this!

The Blog Themes

I’m currently working on the following, simultaneously, which may seem a touch ironic!

First, in line with all of my new branding, I’ve got a delicious new Wordpress theme! It’s similar to this one, however makes better use of my brand colours and I think it’s generally a bit cleaner and nicer.

Secondly, I’m planning on releasing a new Wordpress theme tutorial soon, which will be my first proper tutorial, which I would really appreciate feedback on. As you may have  guessed, part of the reason for leaving the new theme for my blog is so that I can do work on the tutorial around it.

So, expect the theme some time next week, hopefully around about Tuesday, but I can never be sure with this sort of thing, I’ll probably have a last minute urge to change everything, which pushes it all back several months.