Ringing Forums

I'm happy to provide a list of suggestions, but I suspect this forum is not the best way of doing so. I think there would have to be a large amount of "Suck it and see". Some ideas will already be "on the list", some will be non-starters, others will seem like a good idea but don't work in practice, some will work in one place and not another, other initially non-obvious things will become obvious only after some time.

If anyone really knew how to do this, the discussion wouldn't be happening in the first place.

No disagreement here.

as I said, "experienced ringer". I know the difference is there but I still have to mentally adapt when I ring on "real" bells, it would be better if I didn't have to. And I know of one case where someone who learned solely on the sim simply could not ring with real ringers, so realism is important. And I don't have beginners ringing with the moving ropes either, because that would be silly.

There are two workgroups focussed on young ringers... — Graham John

Glad to see it, but it only addresses a small section of the current ringing community. I hope that's "as well as" addressing the issues with progression that many existing, non-youth ringers are facing. We don't need to work to recruit those people, we just need to help them, it's pretty much the definition of low-hanging fruit.

Glad to see the other initiatives as well, but I don't think they are sufficient. As I've already said, the associations in my area are pretty much a busted flush as far as addressing the challenges around method ringing goes - if they weren't then there wouldn't be a problem in the first place. What would help is something that bypasses the current association model when that's necessary.

I have read that some in the the CCCBR would like to move to a direct membership model. To justify that, the CCCBR needs to be providing something that can't be provided by the existing territorial associations. Support for restarting method ringing in areas where it has or is dying out ticks just about every box I can think of. There are a number of ways I think the CCCBR could help, and it is an unrivalled position to do so as it has access to expertise at a national level. One of the earlier posts mentioned "sustainable" and I think that's absolutely key, no point parachuting in expertise if things fall apart as soon as it's gone. Roadshows, courses, ringing centres etc are all good things to have, but empowering and supporting people so they can get to the point where they can self-sustain in the long-term is I believe more important.

Yes, the Stedman equivalent is interesting, particularly when it swaps between H&B and B&H dodges at the back, thank you. And next time my striking looks like the blue line in Abel I'll claim I am right :grin:

On that point, Abel, at least, shows the target striking the same as the red "squared off" version, perhaps it would be good to have an option to display it as the blue one? Mind you, Abel has other things that are probably more important to address, such as not modelling wheel sizes for the moving ringers. An experienced ringer actually picked up on that when I gave him his first go on the simulator, although I believe one of the simulator packages (Virtual Belfry?) does account for wheel size.

t doesn't mean do nothing until 2030 when some magical transformation will occur — Graham John

Phew! :grin: Thanks for the information, as for "initiatives" "being progressed", good to hear it - are there any details available anywhere? Thanks.

Thanks, I'm going to steal that, print it out and put it on the tower noticeboard if I may - I've tried to explain the difference the HSG makes but struggled to get it across - that makes it visually obvious.

It's the same information as https://www.whitingsociety.org.uk/articles/basic-tuition/the-handstroke-gap.html but stripped right back and more visually punchy. I particularly like the with/without HSG side by side comparison in yours.

your suggestions are all good but we have issues which make our area particularly challenging:

• willing to teach method ringing ... plug the gap now before it's too late
  unfortunately my belief is that we are already past that point, we don't have those people any longer. We need to figure out how to restart method ringing as it's dead, at least as far as new ringers are concerned. To learn to ring methods I have to teach myself on the sim, and then travel to ring with a capable band - and there, if I as the "learner" can't go, there may not be enough people to run a practice. That's good for me as I have had to rapidly "ring up" towards the band's standard and I get lots of rope time, but not a good thing overall.
• local support from tower captains ... not available at their home tower
  towers are pretty isolated from each other and many of the TCs can't ring beyond PH themselves - and the geographical area is covered by 4 different associations, so outreach and coordination are particular challenges. For example, until relative recently we didn't have anyone in our tower who was a member of any association.
• Your local associations are probably full of "established ringers"
  they may be elsewhere in the associations, but not near here. The associations are large, some of them would take 2h30m or more to get between the farthest separated towers. We do visit our nearest ringing centre when we can, but it's a 2h drive for 2h30m ringing, and only happens once a month. So whilst there may be suitable people, they aren't realistically accessible to us at the frequency we'd need to re-bootstrap method ringing here.
• a few people with the teaching skills to join a group
  there really aren't any, and those that might be capable are "old school" and/or getting to the end of their ringing careers, or are burned out. Plus I believe part of the reason we are in the current situation is because of the way method ringing was taught in the past - we need a new approach that's more "small steps" and approachable for bands where the majority are method ringing learners - we don't have the luxury of being able to surround people with a band of competent method ringers on a regular basis.
• The phrase "critical mass" is something that has been lurking in the back of my mind. ... I have a suspicion that we are nearing the failure point of method ringing in certain areas ... Some areas may be in too poor a shape to wait for @Simon Linford and co's 2030 plan ... One thing is for certain; the longer it takes for us to make changes, the exponentially harder it will be to make ringing sustainable.
  I think you have nailed it there, our area feels like such a "basket case". As I've said previously it was never great anyway, and I believe is now beyond the tipping point and method ringing is finished here without considered, coordinated and sustained action. On the upside, if it can be fixed here, then I think it can be fixed anywhere :grin:

You mentioned @Simon Linford's 2030 plan, I don't think I've heard about that? In any case, as you say I don't think we have the luxury waiting until 2030 around here.

Ah, but if you are being really pedantic, what about the effect of the handstroke gap? :razz:

Thanks for the helpful info.

I've spoken to people who have rung here going back as far as the 60s & 70s and it's never been particularly great - in the past there were individual bands that had periods of high activity and quality ringing, but not any more. The problem we currently face is that we appear to have dropped below "critical mass" as far as learning method ringing goes, the bands that are still active are elderly, and only CC/PH. There are a couple of towers in the broader area with method bands but they tend to be populated by older ringers and not particularly engaged with learners. It's going to be difficult to move things along without a "backbone" of established method ringers, and even if we had that I think we'd have to coordinate efforts across multiple towers. The issue there is that there are 4 different associations in the immediate area, none of who talk to each other. I think stepping outside of the territorial boundaries in the way ART did is probably the best option, but as I understand it that wasn't an easy process and I'm not well established enough a ringer to take that on.

thanks, those suggested speeds are helpful. I have briefly tried getting them to ring at speeds corresponding to hunting in/out, but I wasn't really sure of what speeds to use - I believe on 6 bells there's around a +/-16% difference between rounds and in/out, does that sound about right?

We need recognition of the challenges ringing is facing in areas like mine, which means listening to what we are saying and accepting the truth of it. It's hard to keep being tolerant when that doesn't happen.

I don't think "poached" is right, they'll just have moved somewhere where they preferred to ring - there are more bells than there are ringers, so people can choose. As Simon says, the incumbent has the legal power to appoint a new TC, in fact TCs are supposed to be approved by the Incumbent although that doesn't always happen.

Have you talked to the ringers who moved? If they aren't interested in coming back even with new leadership then I don't think there's much you can do, other than join them.

I agree Oxford is easier to reuse elsewhere but Kent did help with learning how to make wrong places, and that helped (a bit) with Stedman, although I still need to work on that (p.s. Diary Method is my choice :wink:) And learning the structural relationship between Oxford and Kent was also an "Ahah!" moment. The first time I rang an affected touch of either Oxford or Kent with "real" ringers was a couple of weeks ago, when we rang them both together, laminated rather than spliced I believe. Knowing the relationships between Oxford & Kent was essential, as was the kindness of the conductor!

I rarely get to ring on 8 round here as there are very few major bands and they are populated by black zoners, so out of my league. The minor band who have kindly taken me in have a fairly eclectic repertoire, they can all ring Cambridge but it's not a mainstay, so there was no pressure put on me to learn it. Because of the mix of methods I've rung, when I did decide to finally learn Cambridge it was more a case of "Yeah, I think I can probably hack my way though that" rather than "OMG!", so not rushing into it has I think been the right thing for me as I felt that I was making continual progress all the while. Hopefully I'll get a chance to ring it "for real" within the next couple of weeks :grin:

I disagree — Roger Booth

Yes, I half expected you would. A fresh learner who is still in awe of the existing ringers in their home tower is simply not going to go back and start telling them how things should be done, and if they try they'll either be ignored, or shoved out. And we don't have until 'Old Fred' retires, let alone 10 years. We have 6 months to engage learners, tops, after that most of them will at best get stuck ringing poor CCs in a poor band or worse, just give up. Which they are doing.

I'm not doubting for one minute you are getting the results you describe but it appears there's a huge amount of confirmation bias going on. Claiming that what works for you, from your lofty and well-connected position and in your part the world of ringing world, is applicable to struggling serf ringers in areas like mine is insulting. It makes it sound like you think we just aren't trying hard enough or something. We don't even have 30 ringers in total this side of Manchester, let alone 30 who would come to such sessions.

How about climbing down from your ivory rower and ringing somewhere like I do for 6 months? Then we'll talk. Because at the moment, you are coming across to me as part of the problem, not the solution.

The advantage of using the sim to "pace" a helper for the learner to follow is you know that the striking will be right, particularly coming off the front/back. The first time I did this with someone who was already PH-ing with the band, they were all over the place and they were astonished at how big the speed changes were supposed to be. That's because the rest of the band weren't doing it correctly either, and they had just learned what they saw...

I agree, ropesight and rhythm are two sides of the same coin, once I could strike in more or less the right place by "feel" then I had enough spare brain cells to look for the next bell, which helped me strike better - a virtuous circle.

I know a few experienced ringers who claim they can't hear their bell and ring solely by ropesight, but as soon as you put them on a sim they certainly can, because any mistakes are theirs. I think perhaps with real ringers it can be difficult to decide if it's you or the other guy who is out, on the sim it's only ever you.

With the sim, my learner gets an hour of dedicated practice every week, with a perfect band. It's not a substitute for ringing with a real (imperfect!) band but it's much easier to schedule, and I think regular shorter sessions are probably best for learning ringing motor skills. My view is that the using the sim means that when they do get to ring with a band they can make maximum use of the opportunity, which is more satisfying both for them and the other ringers. Using the sim is in effect physical homework :grin:

I think I've found some related slides in the Meeting Papers, pages 18-25, but not the ones from the pictures you linked to. And I'd still like to hear the presentation :grin:

Thanks for the reply, I think your second paragraph applies to a lot of areas in ringing :wink: I'm looking forward to reading through the PPE articles in order, I've just dipped in and out so far to try to find an answer to my question about Cambridge.

I'm interested to see your Minor methods list. Pre-COVID I'd got about as far as PBM with forays into Grandsire, St Simons & St Clements. During COVID I still had access to a tower simulator, but had to figure out what to ring myself. As I recollect, the first thing I chose was Double Oxford Bob as it was a plain method with the same frontwork as St Cs so I already knew 2/5ths of it, but it had lots of dodges and places, which is what I was struggling to ring accurately. Then it was on to Oxford TB as it felt like an achievable extension of trebling to TB methods, which I'd already done. Then Kent, then Woodbine, because I'd seen it on peal boards round here, and in the "Forbidden Methods" book, and I already knew the front work via Oxford/Kent and other parts were adaptions of parts of Double Oxford. Then I wanted to learn how to learn multiple similar methods, so I learned the Oxford Group (Capel, London Scholars, Kingston, Capel) and how to ring spliced touches of them - that was mostly about learning to think "on the fly" and remember the differences between each of them. Then ringing resumed, and the "Grown ups" were given Norwich as homework so I learned that - it seemed similar to stuff I already knew, I've since learned Woodbine is Oxford below the treble and Norwich above, and Woodbine has been given to the band as homework :grin:

So looking at your list, it's very similar to what I've done blundering about on my own. Learning Cambridge has taken 4-5 simulator sessions, the main "oddity" being the 4 bits of PH which feel rather strange, the front/back/middle work was tweaks to stuff I already knew. However I think if I'd tried to go straight to Cambridge I'd still be struggling, like lots of people I've seen pushed in that direction.

I feel I've come out of the blundering around that I've done is a set of patterns I can glue together into different methods, so rather than "Learning Cambridge" I've "Leaned how to learn Cambridge", and lots of other methods as well, if that makes sense. I must be one of the few people who thinks their ringing has benefited from COVID!

So far so good, I've explained to the learner why I want to try this way and they are happy to give it a go. It helps that they are a recently retired music teacher so used to small steps and individual skills.

She rang briefly 40 years ago as a teenager, one interesting comment she's made is how organised and well structured ringing training is now compared to then. I can't take any credit for that as I'm religiously following the ART scheme, which I've been through myself. But it's good to know that the changes are appreciated by learners who have experienced "The old ways".

As for your comment about ringing with good ringers, I couldn't agree more. I've been lucky to find a Surprise-level band who took me under their wing pre-COVID, even though it's a bit of a trek there. With their help I've progressed from "Struggled with PBD" to "Starting Surprise", the main surprise being that I got there at all! Without their help I'd probably have given up ringing entirely.

I've just stumbled across this thread - our current learner has only had a couple of attempts during practices at CCs but I've already started them on PH - but not in the way suggested above. After 2 sessions they are making a reasonable job of ringing PH on 5 & 6 bells. I've done that by removing everything except the bell handling component, because that's what learners struggle with the most initially. I am running individual simulator sessions for them and a helper has kindly offered to ring PH against the simulator while the learner "shadows" them on a completely silent bell, so they can concentrate solely on bell control. I also count places out loud as they ring, we've already looked at blue lines so they understand the concepts. Once they can control the bell well enough to PH reliably via shadowing we'll move on to ropesight. As a wise ringers said to me when I was struggling:

Ropesight is always easier if your rhythm is right, and gets harder the further out you get. No; it's not fair. If you ring at the right speed, you get to the right place at the right time, and, hey presto, the rope you should be following will be the rope you are following, and will be easy to spot, even though you don't need to, because you've got the bell in the right place anyway.

I'm not really convinced by the suggested 2/3/4/5/6 bell progression, because you need a very willing band to do it - otherwise the learner will only get a short go each week. And in any case, we don't have a band who can ring the suggested methods, so it's a non starter for us anyway.