Sarah Lee shares her reflections on starting her Higher Education journey at the University of Worcester and how the Flexible and Distributed Learning pathway for the FdA Early Years was the most suitable pattern of study for her.
After a complete career change six years ago, I became a teaching assistant in a primary school. I worked my way through my NVQs and was really interested in how children’s development impacts on their learning and future outcomes. Having worked as a HLTA for six months, I decided I wanted to step into teaching. Not wanting to learn how to teach but to learn how I can support children’s holistic development to improve learning outcomes.
Being a single mum in my late thirties and not being able to leave employment to complete a degree, I began searching for an alternative approach to gaining further education. This is where I stumbled across the FdA Early Years at the University of Worcester. It was flexible, with distributed learning and this meant I could access it without leaving employment or reducing my hours; however, it was in Worcester, and I live over 78 miles away in Derby. Not only this but I also had to contend with my self doubt and low confidence in my abilities.
I remember the first time I arrived at the university of Worcester for a Summer school day and was ready to turn back around to go home. Sitting there mentally talking myself out of it, feeling sick with nerves and feeling like an imposter, this is where I met Michelle Malomo, one of the tutors. She convinced me through her natural persona, her love for supporting children and her love of educating that I belonged on the course. I had chosen to do this foundation degree part-time this is because of the number of things I had to juggle and not being sure I could manage the workload or the skill set.
Throughout this Foundation Degree, I have gained a lot of technical skills through using the blackboard, video recording through Panopto and Microsoft Teams (which is an achievement in itself!) My biggest challenge throughout was balancing everything! Creating the time to study and complete Online Learning Activities (OLAs) and assignments as well as full time work, family commitments, and life in general. I enjoyed putting my learning into my assignments but always had the self doubt lurking around in the background. Looking back now, I achieved better than I thought I would and that is thanks to the excellent knowledge, teaching, and support of all the module tutors and fellow students as well as my amazing Professional Partner.
My biggest ‘wow’ moment for me was when I completed the last piece of work for the professional identity module in the first year. This was the first time I felt like I could reflect on how much I gained from this course and how I had changed. My confidence in my practice and myself grew so much, that I barely remembered what my practice and my identity was like beforehand. Through each year of the Foundation Degree, my confidence, knowledge, and practice has gone from strength to strength, having the confidence to advocate for children and other practitioners and inducing positive changes in practice. Although I started my journey wanting to be a teacher, I am now exploring other possibilities to help improve children’s outcomes.
Finally achieving a goal of mine to attend university and being one of the few to have done so in my family, I feel that I have become a positive influence for others, especially for my boys, to be resilient, not be afraid to aim high and achieve your dreams. Having graduated from the Early Years Foundation degree at the age of Forty, this as spurred me onto the BA (Hons) Integrated Working with Children and Families Top Up Degree and possibly further.
If you are interested in finding out more about the FdA Early Years (0-8 years), visit our webpage or contact Course Leader, Samantha Sutton-Tsang: s.sutton-tsang@worc.ac.uk