Hi Maria. I went back to college last year to do my level 3 - 20 years after doing level 2! and I was the oldest on the course. I was also really worried that maybe I'd be too old to start learning again and concerned I'd be left behind as all the other students had done Level 2 the previous year, so the A&P was still fresh in their minds. I have never been an academic person either so I wasn't sure how I was going to cope. I was really surprised to find I had actually remembered the majority of the bones from 20 years back, but I found the muscles much harder to remember. The best way I found to learn and remember them was to take lots of photocopies of the skeleton and the body muscles (front and back) and I used to use a pencil to label them over and over again until I got them all right, but I needed to recap on it regularly to make sure I didn't forget! But it really, really worked for me. With regard to the action of muscles, that was harder! My tutor was amazing and once we had learnt which muscle was which she then got us to use that muscle to help us remember what action it had. I also got my husband and daughter (who was doing level 2 at the same time!) to test me on them. That was definitely the hardest part for me though! I did an NVQ so I'm not exactly sure how your City and Guilds exams will be marked but labelling diagrams gained high points on the NVQ so getting as many of them right as possible really helped with the overall pass mark.
On a final note, despite being the oldest and not having ever achieved great results in school exams, having a shocking short-term memory and also working on the days I wasn't at college I somehow managed to pass every exam first time and was awarded the Level 3 Beauty Therapist of the Year Award so please, please don't think you're too old to learn! I loved my year back at college so much and I really miss it now! Good luck and believe in yourself!
