Being familiar with the layout of COP from last year, I was able to start the module and structure my ways of working more clearly and efficiently. Additionally, my starting point of 'how we can save the NHS' was something that I was, and still am passionate about which encouraged me to elaborate to a greater extent within my written and practical work.
One of the main things that I struggled with was how to structure the argument within my essay, as I found that in my first few drafts I was just outlining the problems within the NHS rather than coming up with an argument or statement in able to potentially solve the issue. I was able to build on this by synthesising the content of my essay by looking at the psychology behind different methods of persuasive advertising, and the extent of how language and imagery together can be an extremely powerful force. This lead me to look at the effectiveness of advertisements developed by the food industry and fast food corporations, versus the campaigns launched by the Public Health sector of the UK Government in trying to combat 'avoidable' health conditions such as type two diabetes. Building on my academic writing skills enabled me to consider more deeply and reflect upon different writers and authors statements in relation to health and to advertising, for example learning how to triangulate and paraphrase allowed me to make connections with similar views and opinions to create a stronger argument.
I definitely feel as though my written work is the stronger section of my submission, partly due to the fact that I allocated myself the most time for this section and also that I surprisingly enjoyed writing it! This has reinforced the concept that having a broad knowledge of a subject area allows the exploration of visual solutions to be limitless, simultaneously thinking on a wider scale of how to communicate the facts that I know to a specific audience or group.
In terms of research, there is a great deal of news items concerning the state of the NHS and public health currently, which was really helpful as I was able to visually respond to articles on a weekly basis which significantly increased my levels of motivation and interest in the subject. Although in hindsight, I think this aspect made me rather complacent in the fact that a lot of the time I would solely rely on secondary research as opposed to taking the extra step to gather research first hand, which could have lead to a more effective outcome. For example, I think that if I would have interviewed members of staff in the NHS, and possibly people that were willing to talk about their experiences with lifestyle related illnesses, this would have given me more of a personal and accurate perspective of surrounding issues.
Unfortunately I have to admit that there are a lot of weak areas in my submission, and work ethic in general during COP2. If I am being completely honest, my attitude towards this module have been somewhat poor and I'm pretty disappointed with myself as a result of this. This is partly due to the fact that COP is a 'long thin module', which means that there isn't a greater sense of urgency to complete and develop work in a short period of time, and it isn't prioritised as much as the more heavily practical based modules, meaning that it 'feels like we have ages' to build a substantial body of work.
Despite this, I think that when I got on a roll with productivity, my interests and enthusiasm was amplified which lead me to developing new ways of working that I never would have considered before, for example the comic strips showing the reaction and thought processes when trying to lose weight in an environment that is suffocated by consumerism. However this didn't serve me too well when it came to producing the final publication, as I did NOT anticipate the length of time required to produce a comic... which resulted in me rushing a lot of things at the last minute which jeopardised the level of quality within my work.
The past two years my very first starting point from the given list has been 'social', which has lead me to develop a huge interest in the human condition and explore different types of behaviour and interaction. This is something that I am keen to take forward into the COP3 research project, which I am thinking at this stage about looking into how visual aids can be a more powerful means of communication within the healing environment and other non-consumerist based areas and organisations. As COP3 is a pretty big deal, I will take my experiences from COP2 to build on my strengths and capitalise on my weaknesses, which include; carrying out more personal-based research, PLANNING MY TIME WELL, anticipating the length of time required to create practical solutions and generally having a more positive and enthusiastic attitude towards the module.
No comments:
Post a Comment