Week 3 27th Feb - 2nd March

This week the students have begun their horticulture practical project. I caught the end of a talk from Blair who is a bonsai fan and brought some of his trees in to show the students. As he said, he is unlike the 'typical' bonsai grower (an 80 year old!) but seems to be pretty passionate about bonsai. He also very kindly gave away 2 trees - Cory and Emily I hope your trees have long and happy lives!

We were invited up to the Malcam Trust by Garth for some team building fun and games.He had set up a variety of activities to get everyone moving, thinking and working together. I think my favourite was one where we stood in a circle with each of our positions marked by cones - we were given instructions to move from our position 1 to position 2 and were timed. It required quick thinking and even quicker moving to get back to our original spot without crashing into anyone else.

Garth even made lunch for us too! (not turtles)

Week 2

This week has still been a bit of an orientation week with a mix of activities such as ALNAT assessments, the Harassment talk and computer induction. We went along to Clubs day at Clubs and Societies - good timing because we got a free lunch (no such thing as a free lunch?!) and loads of other free goodies (I think a few students signed up for the National Party just to get blue cake), as well as a look at what's on offer outside of course time.

First Aid training was run by Eliot from First Aid solutions - congratulations everyone for passing and getting your First  Aid certificates!

Term 1, Week 1 - Orientation week

Orientation week was a week of comings and goings, introducing students to staff and giving them a chance to find their way around Polytech. We went out to a team building event at Chingford park, involving about 200 students from  Architechture, Building and Engineering (ABE) and Trades. Stations had been set up around the park with challenging activities for the groups - I think one of the biggest challenges was the wet drizzly weather. There was good participation and a great bbq lunch afterwards!
The Amazing Poly race was also challenging, with students having to find info from all around the Polytech campus. Congratulations Savou and Talai for your team win!
The students met Kim, Jamie and Phil down at L block and had a very thorough tour and intro to their Horticulture module.

|Welcome to Foundation Studies Trades

Welcome to  Foundation Studies Trades 2012!
It has been really good to meet all the new Trades students - I hope you are all settling in to Polytech life and finding your way around.
This is the first time we have used a blog for teaching and learning. I am still becoming familiar with it -   I think it will be an interesting way for students to record what they have been doing and learning. I'm looking forward to seeing what the students have been doing in their horticulture practical sessions with Kim and Jamie, through the blog.
Michelle