We seem to have settled into regular May and October/November Training days and in offering at least one of these days in both the north and south of the county. This year our May event was held at Eckington and was a repeat of a day held in 2004 in Belper called ‘Towards Better Practice Nights’. The repeat of this day was decided, as there was many new tower captains in the area who it was thought might benefit from such a day. The day is very much centred on discussion groups and sharing ideas of best practice. It was received well by those who attended.
Our October day was based around both Etwall and Eckington running similar sessions in both areas and hoping to attract a few people from the southern end of the county. This day was oversubscribed and people were turned away. Five churches were used in the south offering Call Changes, Plain Hunt, Bob Doubles and Bob Minor with 15 people attending and three churches in the north with 12 people attending. The idea was that participants would attend for the whole day and no half-day rate was advertised but many people decided that they could only attend for half the day despite paying for the whole day. In the north some sessions covered a variety of abilities due to the varied learning goals requested by the students. This was not ideal, so on future courses we will aim to make the teaching groups more specific.
We appreciate all the training that is done in towers and districts, and we thank those who are involved with this as well as all those ringers who answer our pleas for helpers on the courses organised by the committee, without you we could not offer any training at all. We would like to encourage more ringers to think about helping, you do not have to be an expert to be useful on a Training Course, just competent at the level of the course and able to keep yourself right when a pupil hesitates or falters.
Please remember that if we can help with training locally or you have a specific request for training just let us know and we will do what we can to assist.