Into the new academic year

We're now into a slightly strange period of the academic year at the Open University. On the one hand, the year has formally started and the module websites have opened, allowing students to start reading through the content. On the other, the introductory sessions have yet to happen, tutors have not yet been assigned, Tutor Group Forums (TGFs) have not yet opened, details of tutorials are not yet available for booking and some of the first assignments are still locked.

At a glance, this may seem confusing, especially compared to some bricks & mortar universities. Though looking deeper, it's actually not so different from those where module guides are provided to students in advance of the first (teaching) week, allowing them to start thinking ahead, doing early readings and so forth. It just seems a bit different because the module website itself fulfils the role normally taken by lectures.

As is so often the case, some of this comes back to flexibility. By opening the websites a few weeks early, students have the opportunity to start working through the material at their own pace and get ahead of the recommended schedule if needs be - and there are a lot of real life events that might encourage that. For example, students with children can get a week ahead at this stage and then take a week off studying for half-term.

But one of the side effects is that it isn't always possible to do all the early activities in the module units and some momentum can be lost. Some of them ask students to write a short piece, post it on their Tutor Group Forum and then discuss it with other students in replies. However, as the tutors haven't yet been assigned and the TGFs not yet opened, it isn't possible to do this activity. And so the students most likely to start building momentum for online discussions instead often wind up skipping over the posting, leaving some TGFs notably bare and consisting of little more than the tutor posting advice each week.

In addition, the tutorials broadly align to the recommended schedule for the units and the special tutorials to support assignments are close to the deadlines, so there is a risk of ending up out of sync with the plans. So I don't recommend getting too deep into the module at this stage.

However, it's good to get through the early material and in particular to go through as much of the introductory week material as possible. Some of my modules have had as many as seven different sections in the introductory week, ranking from quick introductions to the course to the Law Undergraduate Guide, which is lengthy and updated each year. So the extra time to get through it all is welcome. In addition, if one is taking more than one module at a time, it's good to get a sense of how long each will take and start pacing well.

As well, there are other general introduction activities laid on through Welcome Week, both in-person and online, so there are good opportunities to get (back) into things.

So this phase of the year is not as complicated as it may first seem.

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