Short Projects
Meets on the second Friday of the month, sometimes in the morning, sometimes for a full day, sometimes just in the afternoon, sometimes we have an early lunch out first then congregate in our city centre rooms for the rest of the day.
The group only runs when a new interest is sparked and the 'space' on the timetable is often used for taster sessions for new groups.
Currently it is being used by Current Affairs
The taster session for a new group - 'Current Affairs' was held in the short projects slot on Friday 10th July 2015 and it was just continuing for 6 sessions until December, looking at Citizenship, Civic meetings, rights and responsibilities of citizens, etc all of which is hopefully being dealt with as information seeking, without becoming 'political' but they have now decided to go on by looking into various European voting methods and then discussing the EU and referendum. It is being led by one of our members with various contributions from the group.
2015 also saw the Magna Carta Day. This was a study day delivered by Catherine Stevenson about Magna Carta and its effects on society since 1215.
The previous Short Project was a whole day in May 2015, starting with a talk by Sheila Hull, one of our members with a penchant for Art History, who gave us a feeling for
Looking at Paintings from an Art Historian's point of view then the following one Sheila did in January 2016 was Victorian Artists -
October 2016: Sheila's next short project was The Pre-Raphelites
2016: Powerpoint for beginners:There was a short project by Catherine Stevenson,aimed and helping members learn how to use powerpoint. This was extended to four sessions due to demand.
2016: A literature day delivered by Stuart and Katie. Well attended and very informative.
2016: Basic English Grammar and Punctuation: by Catherine Stevenson. There were four sessions and were great fun as well as a learning curve!
It is hoped that in the future there may be enough interest for a Greek Conversation group to begin
Several Short Projects have turned into Groups -
Digital Photography started as a short course and has proved so popular that they are now carrying on with outdoor 'working' parties and a once a month discussion/comparison group.
The Philosophy Discussion was a one-off meeting.
The Spanish Conversation Taster Session had so many people signing up for it that they chose to continue in a Pub for a different atmosphere but might also have a more formal session on an alternative day.
2014
The Short Projects group was not running while I was in Devon for the summer,
2013
We decided to collate all the research done on the short project 'Preparation for the Inevitable - Death' into one document which we have uploaded here - Die Tidy
October was "Antiques of Yours" An expert came to value our own items. This was a fantastic success with great queues of people clutching strangely shaped objects wrapped in newspaper. One had a giraffe's head sticking out of a big carpet bag....
In November by popular request, Joan Congleton repeated her talk on the Bevin Boys and Jean Southwell has written a piece about it Report on the Bevin Boys
In December there was a report on the TAT AGM held in Nottingham in September 2013 by our representative.
Earlier One-off Projects
(or Short Projects as the group is now called)
We had a morning investigating about Dementia and how a family member can help/benefit the sufferer in this interesting way of encouraging Contented Dementia(see sidebar)
The very first One-off project was on Cloud formations(see sidebar)
We held a 'Question The Gardeners' day when two very experienced Gardeners, who are members, accepted questions in advance, got together to decide what was the most relevant answer they might provide and on the day it was run in a similar format to that of a well-known radio programme, with people coming all together as an audience and those whose questions had been accepted by the 'panel' (who refused to be called 'experts' but did allow 'experienced gardeners') read out their question for the benefit of the audience and talk ensued! With many interruptions and supplementary side issues being allowed but having to be curtailed after a short while to get through the list! Then we all adjourned to the pub for further gardening related issues while we ate. We produced a booklet which is available on request.
UPDATE
The Gardeners have agreed to do another such day in the Autumn(2015).