In amongst all my grumbling about M359, I’d mentioned that I though moving on to Block 3, and it’s more programming-style SQL content, would make life a whole lot easier.

I started on Block 3 this evening, and it was like a metaphorical weight being lifted from my shoulders – as expected, SQL queries are much more suited to my mindset, and come with the added advantage that, when I’m trying to figure a query out, I can just feed it into the query analyser and see if the results match expectations. That in itself makes the content a lot easier to work with – the relational algebra of Block 2, you had to work though entirely in your head or on paper, with no guarantee that you were following the methods the course book expected.

According to the course calendar, Block 3 should take 8 weeks to cover – I’m hoping now I’ll have a chance to work up some leeway, so I can get back to other pressing matters: M257, with the exam in early June, and S186, where I’ll be deferring the ECA to the 2nd submission date.

The horror that is M359 continues. I’ve just finished Block 2, the final part of which was all about Normal Forms – 1NF, 2NF, 3NF, BCNF… The chapter started with the ominous warning that…

..students often find the topic of normal forms to be quite difficult. Be aware that you might have to spend more time on this section than on some of the previous sections and that you may have to read parts of the material several times.”

It then launched into a series of examples and mathematical definitions of the various Normal Forms, and I admit a lot of it just went whoosh over my head – I was working through the relevant TMA question along with the chapter, and the chapter introduction wasn’t wrong about having to read and re-read everything before enough of it sank in to make the TMA understandable, never mind doable. Not a pleasant experience.

But right at the end of the chapter, the short section of BCNF takes all that information, all the finding of Functional Dependencies, all the details explanations, and cuts it down to one simple concept: if you have a relation with duplicate data, project over it to create 2-3 new relations that match the FDs. If you still have duplication, do it again. Read that, it looks to be as though 1NF is your original table, 2NF is 2nd attempt (after splitting once), 3NF the third attempt (after splitting twice) – and put like that, it suddenly seems so much more simple.

Now why couldn’t they have put it like that in the first place!? The obvious answer is that the exam is going to ask about the gory details behind the fairly simple explanations – that worries me, but for now I’m just glad to get another chapter out of the way. Onwards to SQL itself…

I’m still plugging away at M359 – normally I’d wait until a TMA is returned before ploughing on into the next one, but with only 1 month between TMA01 and TMA02, there isn’t time. Block 2 is mostly relational algebra – algebra is I think one of those things that everyone remembers from school with dread, and the way it works on relational databases is no more enjoyable, so at the title says, my head is turning to mush just trying to figure it out.

In short: I’m not enjoying this course…

M359 continues, and continues to really test me. Got TMA01 in with 6 days to spare – the latest I’ve been with an assignment submission in nearly three years with the OU – and I was as glad to see it go as I was to see the S199 ECA go. That’s not really a good feeling when you realise there’s still three TMAs and an exam to come…

They don’t give you much time before TMA02, either – it’s due in a month, so there’s no time to take a breather before delving back into the course. Block 2 seems to be mostly relational theory, with the emphasis on converting back and forth between relational models and entiti-relationship diagrams – it’s very dry material, and very hard going, as the subject is just abstract enough that I find it hard to really concentrate enough on the details for them to sink in. Fun, fun, fun. I think my chances of a distinction on this one are remote – and that’ll have a huge knock-on effect on my hopes for a first-class degree classification. Aaargh.

On the bright side, Block 3 approaches, and that’s all SQL. I’m quite looking forward to that, on the assumption that SQL is at heart a “programming” language, and my scores on the Java courses have showed I have an aptitude there. Hopefully that’s not a misconception….

S199 results are out, and it’s another Pass for me – although I really wasn’t happy with this course. 5 Learning Outcomes assessed, 3 Achieved and 2 Just Achieved, which using my rough-and-ready percentage converter gives a not-great 65%. I’d be upset – for science short courses I’m used to scores in the 90s – but this time around I’m just so glad it’s done that I’m not going to complain.

Now, if only I could find the time to get going on S186…

TMA03 for M257 is back. Being a perfectionist, I’ve queried some of the lost marks on it – there were places were I was docked points despite the code I’d written doing exactly what was specified in the TMA question.

The problem is apparently the marking scheme, which expects the answer in a particular form and no other, and this frustrates me immensely – there’s no way of knowing in advance precisely how the course team expect the answer to be formatted, you can’t ask because it’s a TMA and an answer would give the game away, so you end up having to guess and hope you got it right.

I had the same problem with some questions on M255 (which I always queried, much to my tutors frustration), and once again I plan on querying anything along those lines here, in the hope (more than expectation) of getting an reason why the “official” method is better or more efficient than the ones I’ve used. I’m not holding my breath…

So M359 Relational Databases: Theory & Practice is my first foray into the world of Level 3 courses. Choosing it was an easy decision – I use databases a lot in my day-job (I work in IT), and as a hobbyist (there’s a MySQL database storing the contents of this site, and several others I own), so there’s a natural interest in knowing what’s going on behind the scenes and, hopefully, learning how to do things with them that the scripts I’m currently using won’t allow (although that would also mean learning PHP, and there are time issues that might get in the way of that). So there’s no lack of motivation for this course – a good thing, as it will also count towards my honours classification. Cue scary music.

The OU’s quite open about there being a gap between what’s expected of students at level 2 and at level 3, but there’s a particular word in the course description for this one that I hadn’t noticed before now:

This is a challenging Level 3 course. Level 3 courses build on study skills and subject knowledge acquired from studies at Levels 1 and 2. They are intended only for students who have recent experience of higher education in a related subject, preferably with the OU.

I’ve got the level 2 experience, I’m highly literate – but it’s that word “challenging” that worries me, and if some of the comments I’ve read on First Class about the course hold true, in this context it means “Sucker!! You’re going to fail!”. Hmm.

I have worked through one study session with the course so far, and all I can say at the moment is that there’s a lot of text to work through, although as is usual with Computing courses there are some good exercises along the way to back up the materials & having a natural interest in the subject does help the information stick in the mind. But for the next 8 months I’m going to have a string of warnings ringing in the back of my head…

S186 – Volcanoes, Earthquakes and Tsunamis – is my latest foray into the Science Short Course collection. The course author is David Rothery – he was also responsible for S196 Planets: An Introduction, which I thoroughly enjoyed, so I have high hopes for this one. The subject’s a little off what I’d normally be interested in, but the OU are dangling the Certificate in Contemporary Science over my head. What can I say – I’m a sucker.

The main component of this one is another of Rothery’s books, Teach Yourself Volcanoes, Earthquakes and Tsunamis (Get it here…), which is 296 pages of everything you need to know about volcanic & tectonic activity. Obviously, I haven’t read it yet, so the verdict on how good it is remains open – I’ll let you know in a month or two – but at first glance it looks good.

There’s also a hefty course book with additional materials and activities, and a DVD-ROM with a selection of video clips to back up the other materials. There actually seems to be quite a bit to the course – if you took the time to watch all the videos, you’d be doing terrible things to the time required to complete the course, I reckon – but the OU seems to have worked hard to give you everything needed to get the points taught by the course across.

So first impressions are good. The ECA result will be the true test of that, though…

Some new Science Short Courses are on the way, which may be of interest if you’re like me and can’t resist them. From a post by Audrey Brown (chair of a number of SSCs) in the SSC Course Choice forum on First Class:

SA188 Archaeology: the science of investigation – May 08
S189 Understanding the weather – September 08
S187 Elements of Forensic Science – November 08
S170 Darwin and Evolution – Feb 09
S171 Empire of the Microbes – May 09
S172 Olympic science – Nov 09

We have ideas for 2 new courses to start in 2010, so the first slot for another one will be in the second half of 2010. If you would like to suggest ideas for what that might be, then post them [in SSC Course Choice] and I will pass them on at the next appropriate meeting where we consider new topics.

Nothing there that immediately grabs my attention – I’m more a physics / astronomy nut – but there’s a decent range there.

M257-TMA04 is done, bar going through it for a ’sanity check’ in a week or so – I tend to miss obvious problems if a read through an assignment too soon after completing it. This raises an interesting problem: once Unit 10 is out of the way, that’s M257 done & dusted – but the exam isn’t until June. So just how do I keep the information learnt since October in my head for another 5 months, without the constant kick that TMAs give you to learn things?

The idea was to get M257 finished before M359 began, and I’ve managed that. But it’s a bit of a double-edged sword – if I now bury myself in SQL, I’ll have forgotten all things Java by the time the exam comes around. So here’s the plan: just for once, I’ll be doing the optional, non-assessed Case Study units for M257, as just working through them should help keep things fresh in my head. I’ve also obtained all the M257 & M254 past papers that I can, and I’ll aim to do one of them a month until the exam – should also help me to identify the areas of the course that I skipped over a bit too quickly (I’ve been very lax on note-taking this time out, which may well come back to haunt me). Put all that together, and there should be enough Java work to keep me on course for a decent exam score without getting too much in the way of work on M359.

That’s the theory, anyway. I’ll tell you in August if it worked…