I just noticed on my dashboard that I have written 99 posts, so had an urge to mark the 100th one.

In some ways it is also my first post with the status of “I am no longer an OU MSc Systems Thinking in Practice student”.  So, that is another thing to mark to.  It is great to know that I have the MSc (or at least that the OU will offer it to me soon and then I can put on a gown and collect it), but I also know there is still quite a lot of missing gaps in terms of my understanding of the lineage and traditions of Systems… there is still quite a lot to visit, or perhaps revisit with newer eyes.  I also know that the greatest hurdle is using it for real in my domain of practice – and that depends on others around me being ready for new ideas too – as well as of course the problems with those constraints to systemic practice.  It kind of feels like that moment when you pass your driving test but know that that is just the beginning of really learning to drive and becoming a driver.

It was my study of TU811 that started me blogging.  The module materials suggested it and I took to it as a duck to water.  As a student the blog served as a way of making explicit the learning I took forward from particular sections of reading – it added rigour to my studying practice by not moving on until I had kind of summed up what I understood.  The blog also served as a way of being able to lay down my thoughts about what the theory meant in terms of my work as well as a way of using theory to reflect on my experiences at work. It also acts as a good ‘index’ to the history of things I have covered – I often use the search box in the top left hand corner to re-find posts…much, much better than the pile of never-touched-again notebooks that sit alongside my OU materials on the bookshelf.

So, how do I take the use of my blog forward as I cease my formal studies.  It could be so easy to let it slide, just read the odd thing about systems and not go through that rigour of making explicit the learning.  It would also be so easy to go back to reflecting just in my head and to lose the rigour in that too.

… just hope that I can work out a way of continuing to use this ‘aide’ to learning into my day to day life…with no looming deadlines and other students to keep me going, can it be the same?

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