Looking Back At: March 2014

So, this month meant me going back to school after half term which I was both happy about and slightly not looking forward to. I was looking forward to the fact that I would be more productive during the day but I wasn’t looking forward to controlled assessment deadlines coming in. As soon as I walking into my Resistant Materials class I was told that I had five weeks left until my assessment would be submitted for marking. I has gotten me to get my skates on through and I’m doing my best to make sure that I’m keeping on top of everything going on.

I’ve been throwing myself into a lot of revision and trying to make sure that I’m doing as much preparation as possible ready for May and June. That hasn’t been going to badly and I’ve been making sure I’m attending all after school revision classes which have been helping as well. So, school so far hasn’t been going too badly.

Earlier in the month my sister and I ended up signing up for the local 10K run which is slightly daunting but I’m really looking forward to. We decided that we’re going to try and run it in an hour and fifteen minutes so we’ve been going out on runs to train for that. I can say that it is helping my fitness a lot and I always feel pretty happy after going for a run.

I also finally got signed up for the eDofE. I’m doing the Duke of Edinburgh and have been training since November but we hadn’t enrolled online so that we can track all of our skill, physical, and volunteer work. So, we had a meeting where they gave us loads more paperwork and everyone has pretty much decided what they’re doing for each of the sections and the timescale for each one.

I posted up my first Women in Science and Engineering post this month and am looking forward to posting a more in the coming months. I was speaking to the head of technology in my school who said that he was more than happy to put up some of my posts on his display outside his room which made me extremely happy. The whole reason I’m doing this is to raise awareness of these amazing women and that it’s not unusual for women to go into this line of worse. So, t have him say that he wanted them up meant because hopefully people will start to realise that even though science and engineering is male dominated there are a lot of women in these two fields who have done a lot to contribute.

I’ve also done yet another training day for Duke of Edinburgh which was amazing. It was the first time that it was actually warm and wasn’t tipping down with rain which is always a nice surprise. It was a pretty short walk this time but I would have loved to walk for a little bit longer. We ended up having to draw our own maps and learning some first aid whilst we were out there. 

Book-wise, this month has been slightly slower than February but that books I’ve read or am in the midst of reading have been awesome!

I’ve finished:

• The School for Good and Evil by Soman Chainani
• Soulmates by Holly Bourne
• Larby Lodge by G & P Gallacher

And I’m currently reading:

•  Undone by Cat Clarke

I’ve gotten 13 out of 50 books done for my 2014 reading challenge and am currently one book ahead of schedule! I’ve got a feeling that next month might be a little bit of a slow reading month since exams are going to be so close by but I shall have to wait and see!

So, what did you all get up to in March and what plans do you have for April?

Looking Back At: January 2014

January is already gone and I really can’t believe it. I tend to find that January is a month that drags by after the huge hype of Christmas and New Year’s. This year though, it seems like it’s gone by pretty fast and if that means seeing the last of this appalling weather then I will be more than happy to say goodbye to it. 

It’s not been an extremely exciting month for me. To be honest, I’ve just been trying to get back into the swing of things with school. It’s been pretty busy and I’m just trying to make sure that I’m keeping on top of all of my work. School has been school and there’s not much else to say on that topic. 

Llanelli Bay Training Day 

I’ve been spending this month becoming a secret agent, with my sister’s 21st birthday approaching very quickly, I’ve been planning out her birthday party and trying to make sure that she doesn’t find anything out. Sometimes I really would love going into party planning, then I see how unorganised I am when it comes to it and think again. 

January saw me doing my second Duke of Edinburgh training day which is only making me look forward to my actual expedition. It’s made me talk to the people in my group a lot more and we have a laugh even outside of training now. I’m looking forward to my next training day now, which is in March, so it’s a little bit of a wait. 

I also signed up for the Ninja Book Swap for Valentine’s Day that I cannot wait to do. I’ve never done a book swap before and the girls who are running it seem like such lovely people. It’s going to be amazing! 

My reading goal for this year was to get through 50 books. I didn’t feel like I read as much as I could last year and I really wanted to be able to read more again. So, here are the books I had gotten through in January. 

• The Shadowhunter’s Codex by Cassandra Clare and Joshua Lewis 
• A Living Nightmare (Cirque Du Freak #1) by Darren Shan 
• The Glimpse by Claire Merle 
• Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead 
• What Really Happened In Peru (The Bane Chronicles #1) by Cassandra Clare and Sarah Rees Brennan 
• The Boy In Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne 

I really didn’t think I would be able to get through all of those books but I have loved them all and cannot wait to get onto reading some more this month. Though, I have no clue what I want to read next! 

D of E: Winter Training

My training for my Duke of Edinburgh (D of E) expedition has started and I’ve already done two of them. My first one was in October and I just had my second one in the middle of January. We get told that they’ll spread our training days out throughout the year so we get a good taste of all the different kinds of weather conditions that we might have to face and how people camp in them.

So, my past two training days have generally been around about the winter time so I’ve been trying to find the easiest way to get through these training days and feel as warm as possible and still get as much out of them as possible.

One of the most important things I could say is wear layers, as many layers as you can manage. It can feel slightly uncomfortable as first but trust me, you will be thankful for them in the long run. Especially, if like me, some of your training days are near the coast. I normally end up with a vest, a thin v-neck jumper, a hoodie and then a waterproof coat. For me, that doesn’t tend to be too bulky but it stops me from feeling cold. A waterproof jacket really is your best bet for any training day to be honest because you never know what the weather will be like and you know for sure that the rain won’t seep through the material.

Getting a flask of tea or coffee or hot chocolate or really any drink that’s warm s a huge help. Whether you keep it in a side pocket of your bag so you can drink it as you go along or just in your bag so when you take a break for lunch you can drink it. It’s surprising how much it can actually help you out. It warms you up pretty quickly.

Hats, gloves and scarves are always a good idea. I only really tend to take my gloves and a scarf and then I‘ll just use my hood. But extra heat is always a good thing. It just makes your experience a whole lot more enjoyable and you don’t mind training for that little bit longer then. Hand warmers are a good idea too, just to stick them into your pockets because I tend to find that even with gloves on, my hands get numb quite quickly.

Clear plastic pockets are a good idea to take with you as well if you have a map or know that you’re going to be given to them. It just stops them for being oaked by the rain or twisted around by the wind. It just ends up keeping them a lot tidier.

Winter training days can be pretty hard to get through but if you got prepared you’ll find that you’ll enjoy them a lot more and get a lot more out of them. 

D of E: Interviews & Perks

So, this May I had applied for a spot on the Duke of Edinburgh (D of E) team in my school and managed to get on. The D of E Award is open for anyone that’s between the ages of 14 and 24 and there are three stages to it: Bronze, Silver and Gold. A lot of the time secondary schools offer the first two awards. There are four stages to gain the award. Volunteering, this is undertaking a service to individuals or your community. The physical aspect is you having to improve an area of sport, dance or fitness activities. The skill aspect is developing practical and social skills in an area of your own interest. And then there’s the last section, which is the Expedition. With this one, you have to plan, train and complete a journey in the UK or abroad. There’s an extra Residential part for the Gold award which Is basically you working away from home and doing a shared activity. 

A lot of people tend to wonder if the D of E is for them and what it will help them with. The D of E award is literally for anyone who’s looking for an adventure, doesn’t mind the outdoors and loves a challenge. You need to have a lot of dedication to complete the award and know that you can balance everything else that is going on it your life as well because it will be time consuming, You also need to be aware of the fact that there are costs involved in joining and also when you’re buying your kit for the expedition. Keeping all that in mind, the Duke of Edinburgh Award is something that tests you in every single area. It makes you grow as a person and develop new skills that you didn’t know you had. It’s about breaking boundaries that you had built up and setting you new ones time and time again. It makes you work with people that you may have never have spoken to before and make new relationships along the way. It gives you things that employers are looking for all the time and just by them looking at your CV and seeing that you have the award shows them that you can demonstrate so many different skills. 

The way you get onto D of E is going to be different from place to place but we had three different stages in my school. We had to sign up for the award, that was then narrowed down to 60 people by all of our D of E leaders and then we had an interview with them and that was narrowed down to the final 30 people that would be on the team. So, if you do have to go through an interview for it, which they tend to do, the questions they ask you aren’t really difficult. Basically, they just want to get to know you and the type of person that you are is all. They tend to ask what the four different areas of the Duke of Edinburgh are because if you want to do the award they expect you to know what you have to do. They might ask you the Duke of Edinburgh actually is and a lot of people tend to say Prince Charles for some reason (that’s not who it is guys). After that they tend to ask questions about you, so there’ll be ones like why you want to do the Duke of Edinburgh. My best advice to you for this question is just be honest as to why you want to do it, you don’t have to have a mile long answer that you spent days writing. If you wanted to take part in the award because it looked interesting and it was something you think you would enjoy then tell them that. They just want to know that you’re not doing this because your friends are and just because it looks good on your CV. They might ask what you think your top three qualities are and what you think they are looking for when they are looking for D of E candidates. Once again, just be honest with them. This whole interview is for them to get to know you better as a person because a lot of them time they don’t know you that well. Just go in there and be confident and smile. Show them that this is something that you really want and that you’re really passionate about. Make yourself stand out from the crowd; you don’t know how many people they’re going to have to interview so make sure that you stay in their mind. 

There might be some people who have reached over the age that award will actually accept Bronze participants but that’s fine. You don’t need to do your Bronze in order to do your Silver or even your Gold award. You can go straight to them; you’ll just have to do an extra few months of your physical, skill and volunteer area. So, even if you feel as though you aren’t quite ready to do the award now or that you don’t have the greatest amount of time at the moment but still want to do the award, you still have up until the age of 24 to complete it all. 

It’s a great opportunity and even though I have only just started to training for it, I am loving every single second of it. Just be yourself through your interview and be honest with them. There are so many places that give you the chance to take part in this award, schools, colleges, universities cadets and other organisations within your community. Just because one place hasn’t accepted you doesn’t mean that you can’t do the award at all just look around for other places that give you the chance as well. There will always be a place that is looking for people to take part in the award.