When I was first learning to ring (in fact for a long time after, if truth be told) when ‘good ringers’ spoke about how good or bad the striking was I did what most adults do when they don’t understand something – I nodded sagely in agreement so as to disguise my ignorance!
Had I been wiser I might have asked for an explanation but an unwillingness to appear naive seems to be a common feature of adulthood.
The thing is, my brain couldn’t actually make any sense of the sound that was being made – it was just a cacophony of sound. My mind couldn’t create any connection between the physical act of pulling a rope and the audible result. It was just the same when others were ringing.
What’s more, I didn’t actually understand what it was supposed to sound like. What ‘good striking’ actually was.
I think this is a common problem especially among those of us who take up ringing in mid (or later) life and who are learning at towers which are struggling. This is a very common scenario.
I was recently preparing to teach a call changes course and I was mulling over this issue. The problem for a learner is that those with a little (or a lot) more experience presume that the jargon we use is understood. We teach people how to achieve better striking by quite rightly concentrating on their handling without making sure they understand the very basics of the rhythmical sound we are aiming to produce.
So, with the help of Jack Pease and a few others I produced a short, 2 minute video with the aim of helping people to understand what ‘good striking’ means and how to recognise it when they hear it.
I hope you find it useful. Please pass it on to your learners – I really hope it helps. Do let me know if it does.
Andy Waring
[You should see the video below but if not you can watch it here on YouTube]
