• Monday: I went to an auction of the largest musical memorabilia collection in the country. I learnt the basics of camerawork and how to set up the equipment.
• Tuesday: I went to the court in Bristol and waited for a Paedophile so we could film him. He got sentenced to six months in jail so we failed to get the shots we wanted. I learned that the life as a cameraman wasn’t all fun!
• Wednesday: We went to Frome to film the retirement of a cattle auctioneer who had been doing his job for 50 years. We had to film lots of cows and a fast talking auction.
• Thursday: There wasn’t much to do on Thursday. We only found a job at 4:30pm. There was a triple stabbing in Bristol and we had to film the crime scene. It was at a hairdressers and an ex-boyfriend of one of the staff there went crazy and stabbed all 3 of the women in the shop.
• Friday: We were sent to Bridgewater to film the return of two kidnapped geese nicknamed “The Bridgewater two”! We spoke to the Mayor of Bridgewater and then got stuck in a 30 mile traffic jam but the whole week was fun!

I was placed at Clifton (Bristol) and also placed in Chepstow (Wales). I was working with my uncle doing flooring. I was helping put in carpets, vinyl and hardboard. I also helped lift up old flooring and cutting and fitting door bars.

• MONDAY: I worked in Cliffdon at a barbers fitting wood flooring. Before we went I helped load all the equipment from the depot.
• TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY, THURSDAY: I Was working at a hotel in Clifton called The Hawthorns Hotel. I was lifting up different types of floor e.g. vinyl and hard board. And I was fitting it as well also measured door bars and fitting them.
• FRIDAY: I went over to Chepstow and fitted a carpet. And had a half-day.

Over the week I learnt a lot of techniques and I enjoyed it a lot.

For Work Experience I worked with a registered child minder who looked after a wide age range of children from approximately 10 months old to 10 years old. Most of the children over five years old who went to school each day were taken to school by the childminder and then picked from school as well, then brought back to the childminders house till after dinner when they parents came to collect them. However each day she had a maximum of three under five-year olds that were with the child minder the majority of the day till after dinner, apart from one child who attended nursery in the mornings who was picked up by the childminder at 11am from the nursery.

The first child generally arrived at 7:45, which meant I had to be up at 7am and the children had all gone home by approximately 6pm. As the majority of the parents had the usual 9am – 5am jobs the children had to be dropped off earlier than this and picked up later as the parents needed transport time to get to work. Therefore childminders have to work at least two hours more than the usual 9am – 5am jobs.

At times it was hard working for such a long time but the children were really nice and I really enjoyed the placement. In the day it was a lot quieter as the older children were at school so that was when I learned about correctly looking after the children and learned how often the 10-month-old baby had food and how regularly she needed a drink.

As well as learning the routine that the child minder had to go through to become a registered childminder and the requirements she has to comply with and guidelines of how child friendly her house has to be to comply with standards. Also I learned how to entertain the 3 year old and introduce learning into the activity. I also learned how to respond to a child that’s crying or sort out any disputes between the children correctly and fairly. However the atmosphere in the childminders house was always nice and the children were all friends with each other and every child really liked the childminder and the children were all very well behaved.

After the school run in the afternoon which I went on (as well as the school run in the morning) it was very busy and it seemed an impossible time making sure the older children were alright as well as looking after the under five year olds and then cooking dinner for them all. However the childminder juggled all three brilliantly and every child had her full attention all the time and she always knew exactly what was going.

I’m glad I took the placement as it was fun working with the children and learning from the childminder but it was tiring at times but there was always something to do so I never thought about how tired I was. As I had such a good time on work experience I would seriously consider going into child minding in the future and would recommend anyone with an interest in looking after children to do this for work experience or a similar job like working in a primary school.

Responsibilities & duties: Raking all the bunkers once every day, sorting out the sprinklers (taking them apart and cleaning them, making sore they cover every part of the green/tee)

Golfers make repairing divots on tee every day.

Health and safety issues, special clothing: steel toecap boots, follow health and safety poster in office.

Daily Diary: Start at 6:30am every day, break at 10:30 Finish at 2:30pm.

• Day 1: Repaired all divots on all the tees, finished 10:30.
  • Break/ start at 11:00am started on all 140 sprinklers, finished 2:30pm
• Day 2: Raked all 56 bunkers by hand, finished 10:30am
  • Break/ start 11:00am do the sprinklers again, finished 2:30pm
• Day 3: did all 56 bunkers again, finished 10:30am
  • Break/ start 11:00am kept doing the sprinklers, finished 2:30pm
• Day 4: Raked bunkers where animals made marks, finished 9:30am, started sprinklers, finished 10:30am
  • Break/ Start 11:00am Mr Rushden came and saw me. Kept on with the sprinklers, finished 2:30pm
• Day 5: Raked Bunkers where animals have made marks till 10:30am
  • Break/ start 11:00am, finished doing the sprinklers.

Responsibilities and duties.

Helping with deliveries of new computers, unpacking them, setting them up and imaging them, which is making a direct copy of the hard drive. I also went and helped them with problems they encountered around the school e.g. problems with the teachers e-mail accounts, and I did lesson support which was helping out in ICT lessons. Lastly I helped to build a new server for the school.

For my work experience I went to my old primary school. I worked with year 5 and 6. My role in the classroom included taking the children out one by one to assess them on the first aid work they’d been working on. I also helped the children learn their lines and build the scenery for their play. But most of all I enjoyed working with the children individually. For example I worked with one girl who had learning disabilities and another boy who was slightly dyslexic.

It was really strange going back to my old school and seeing all my old teachers, and even though it was quite embarrassing at break and lunch time, I really enjoyed it and got a lot out of it. Although I don’t think teaching is right for me, as I would like to concentrate on art as a career.

I worked with a group of children to teach them numeracy, literacy, arts and computer skills.

I had to make sure the equipment was carried correctly and all chairs were tucked under the tables.

Overall, my work experience was a thoroughly enjoyable week, because the staff I worked with were very nice and friendly and made me feel an equal and the children were very nice as they talked to me about themselves, listened to me when I was talking and asked me questions about KLB and what I was like. Working with children, helped me discover that I might like to go into a career working with infant children.

For work experience I went to and worked in visual. There was a team of 4, I really enjoyed the week and did not want to go back to school.

Lisa Higgins who is the team leader picked me up at 7.30. We got there at about 8.15 and started about 9.45

I worked in Debenhams at Gloucester for a week. In this week I learnt many of the responsibilities that will be useful to me in later life. I didn’t know anyone at work so it was quite scary at first but everyone was very friendly and looked after me so I felt like part of the team. I worked in retail on the Women’s Department. My main duties were to make sure that my department was neat and tidy and to be polite and helpful to customers and to try and my colleagues as much as possible. I had to wear black trousers and a white shirt to work so it was just like your uniform without the tie. It is a really good idea to have FLAT shoes because my feet were so painful by the end of the week I had to take painkillers. That is the one problem with standing on your feet all day but you are always busy doing something so you don’t think about it till you get home. There were only a few Health and Safety regulations I had to abide by and these were:

1. To sign in the book at the desk to say when I had arrived and when I had left.
2. If I wanted to go out at lunch I had to sign out and sign back in again so people knew where I was.

These were the only rules I had to keep and they were easy to do so.

I felt it was a really good experience and that I’ve learnt a lot. I think if people are interested in retail then Debenhams is a really good place to apply for work experience.

I worked on the computer drawing architectural designs and elevations using Drawing Express. I also had to watch and listen as Mr Barnes talked to clients, both in his office and on site.

Day One

• I met the Mr Barnes and the other employees both in his office and in the company that shared the building. I then designed a house on paper and transferred it onto the computer with the help of Mr Barnes. I then had an hour for lunch and I ate with the receptionist whom I already knew. After lunch I continued drawing my design on the computer.

Day Two

• I arrived in the morning and carried on with my house design on the computer. I did this all morning until lunchtime. After lunch I watched Mr Barnes talk to a client and for the rest of the afternoon I added the final touches to my drawing.

Day Three

• Today I went on two site visits. In the morning we went to visit a woman about an extension. When we got back I started on another house to the specification that Mr Barnes gave me. In the afternoon we went on another site visit to talk to the builders about what they were doing and how they would go about it.

Day Four

• Today I met the part time employee called Nick. I also continued drawing my second house. In the afternoon Mr Barnes went out and so I stayed with Nick who showed me how to do the more complicated aspects of my drawing.

Responsibilities and duties: Working around Southmead hospital fixing computers.

I was mainly going around the hospital fixing computers with certain members of the systems team. The problems ranged from very easy to very puzzling. Certain jobs were slightly tedious as the slow systems made the job take longer. After each job a short report has to be written as to whether you fixed the job and how you did it (to aid future people dealing with the problem if it reoccurs). I wrote a few of these reports. I spent a little time with the systems team, and while I was there they were making sure the tape backups were correctly installed and stored etc. Finally, I temporarily worked with the programming team, and they taught me some of the syntax for certain programming languages, and how to use things from visual studio.