The First 6 Months

So before I forget here is the overview of my first 6 or so months of my PhD. Since the beginning alot has happened.


Pre-PhD:
After the hectic and extremely stressful finishing of my masters thesis I was left with just a week to find somewhere to live in Newcastle. Cue a last minute frantic search for places that didn't look like a crack den. I headed up to Newcastle with my parents and the bare minimum still not knowing where I was going to live. I had arranged to see 4 rooms. The first room was too small, the second room had gone by the time I was too see it. The third place was a similar sized room to the first, but was in a much better position. In the end a room was better than no room so I took it. I had arrived!

The First Semester:
I really wanted to hit the ground running and I was certainly given that by my supervisors. Since my topic encompasses multiple areas, vision, colour perception, two developmental disorders, face perception, emotions. There is alot of things to cover and whilst I would like to be "expert" and at times I feel I don't know much at all. I guess however that this is an opportunity to learn as much as possible. Maybe I will have done something write if I know more when I finish than when I started.

I also found out that I would be helping students with their dissertation projects. Something I wasn't expecting at all! A bit of mixed bag, but I saw some promise there. Having the students really made me check that I understood my own designs and theory behind the research. There was also a mixture of ability and differences in strengths. Some were good with children, others with experimental design, whilst others hearts were in the right place.

I began testing children in schools. I think the tests can be a bit boring, but luckily through many a tip learned from people at Birmingham I was able to motivate them enough to do the tasks properly. Since I have tested a large number of children, I have been able to get some good preliminary results that have enabled me to make a few conference abstract submissions.

Post Christmas:
I went to my first conference presenting work from Birmingham (Thank you to the lab there). It was in London at IOE where I used to work. My poster was well received and whilst I was nervous about people vastly more experienced/qualified than me quizzing me, I enjoyed the experience and learnt a lot from it. Being able to see my friend from Masters course was good too, I was glad to hear that their PhD was going OK.

After the conference it was back to near constant testing up until the present time. Whilst testing itself is not tiring, the travelling and moving around of equipment is. Still I am not complaining, it has enabled me to get off to a flier regarding the data collection and also means that four different projects have begun. Huzzah!

Hectic times when students projects were due in. I had forgotten how scary it is doing the undergraduate dissertation. It might be the biggest piece of work that they do in their entire lives. When I look back at mine and the work that I have done since (masters thesis) and the upcoming first progress review and the eventual thesis, the undergraduate dissertation seems like a little baby.

Moving forward:
I am satisfied with the amount of work done so far (Thank you to all those people who have helped me) but there is still much work to be done. I only have 2.5 years left and I want to do a lot in that time. Still better to be ambitious than not. I still work left from my other places to be finished. I want to try and get published this year, learn how to program properly, continue learning, continue testing!

Onwards! (until the inevitable mood drop)